What’s the Link Between Gamma Ray Bursts and Supernovae? It Might Be Binary Stars

Gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are some of the most violent events in the universe. Some have a power output equivalent to all of the other stars in the observable universe, at least in the spectrum of gamma rays. But we know very little about them. A new paper from researchers on an interdisciplinary team from seven countries puts forth a new theory about how at least one type of GRB happens – when a binary of two specific types of stars collapses and forms a black hole.

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Weekly Space Hangout – Sept 30, 2016: Please Don’t Break Our Hearts Elon Musk

Host: Fraser Cain (@fcain)

Guests:

Morgan Rehnberg (MorganRehnberg.com / @MorganRehnberg)
Dave Dickinson (www.astroguyz.com / @astroguyz)
Kimberly Cartier ( KimberlyCartier.org / @AstroKimCartier )
Yoav Landsman (@MasaCritit)

Their stories this week:

Elon’s Mars fantasy

Hidden spiral arms in planet-forming disk

First extragalactic gamma-ray binary

China’s new 500 metre radio scope

Rosetta’s last plunge

We’ve had an abundance of news stories for the past few months, and not enough time to get to them all. So we are now using a tool called Trello to submit and vote on stories we would like to see covered each week, and then Fraser will be selecting the stories from there. Here is the link to the Trello WSH page (http://bit.ly/WSHVote), which you can see without logging in. If you’d like to vote, just create a login and help us decide what to cover!

If you would like to join the Weekly Space Hangout Crew, visit their site here and sign up. They’re a great team who can help you join our online discussions!

If you would like to sign up for the AstronomyCast Solar Eclipse Escape, where you can meet Fraser and Pamela, plus WSH Crew and other fans, visit our site linked above and sign up!

We record the Weekly Space Hangout every Friday at 12:00 pm Pacific / 3:00 pm Eastern. You can watch us live on Universe Today, or the Universe Today YouTube page.