Korea , March 11 , 1437 . Back then , it was a united country under the formula of the Joseon Dynasty , and paper currency had just been invented on the peninsula . On that very eve , though , Korean stargazers find an plosion of luminousness that they suspected may have been the parturition of a new star within our galaxy . For 14 mean solar day , this young light adorned the night sky , until it vanished without a vestige .
Documented in philosophical texts , the detailed verbal description of the consequence made it seem like more of a genuine astronomic event rather than anythingmore mythological . Now , as report inNature , modern-day astronomers led by the American Museum of Natural History have found the source of the light : a nova , located in theConstellation of Scorpius .
So what exactly is a nova ? Despite the name , it ’s not really linked to supernovae , those far more energetic , incandescent , brilliant stellar deaths that take on several form . The word “ nova ” may derive from a idiom intend “ Modern principal ” , but ironically , they need white midget – the sum remnants of extremely old , dead stars .
Novae loosely form in binary system take a low - mass star and a white dwarf . If they orbit particularly tight , then the white nanus is capable to slip gas from the companion star ’s out gasbag over time . Eventually , all this hydrogen throttle conglomerate on the white dwarf buzz off to a point wherein it becomes incredibly compressed by the forces of sombreness – and it undergoesuncontrollable fusion .
This generates a singular amount of energy , which can be witness across vast distance . They ’re occasionally seen from Earth , and it appear this type of celestial pyrotechnic show was view by Korean astronomers back in the class 1437 .
The source was Nova Scorpii 1437 . This “ non - destructive nuclear detonation ” was n’t incisively easy to find , especially as the upshot was witnessed several century ago . By now , the fires have all burned out .
as luck would have it , novae tend to leave a theme song remnant behind long after the conflagration has ceased : the cooled ash tree and ember of the original burst . Using diachronic information and very quondam photographic home plate , the squad successfully locate the nova ’s ghost in Scorpius ' tail .
After have a closer look at the organisation responsible , the squad found that in the thirties and 1940s , fires were still flaring up . Known as dwarf novae , these form when the accretion of gas by the white gnome is still come about quite rapidly post - nova .
They were thought to be fairly uncommon features , but the writer of this study conclude that “ many older nova become dwarf novae … between successive nova eruption . ”
The world change greatly between the summit of the Joseon dynasty and the advent of the Second World War , but intelligibly , in place , some thing never change .
