Supernova that outshines all others

A supernova at least twice as bright and energetic, and likely much more massive than any yet recorded has been identified by an international team of astronomers, led by the University of Birmingham. The team, which included experts from Harvard , Northwestern University and Ohio University , believe the supernova, dubbed SN2016aps, could be an example of an extremely rare 'pulsational pair-instability' supernova, possibly formed from two massive stars that merged before the explosion. Such an event so far only exists in theory and has never been confirmed through astronomical observations. Dr Matt Nicholl , of the School of Physics and Astronomy and the Institute of Gravitational Wave Astronomy at the University of Birmingham, is lead author of the study. He explains: "We can measure supernovae using two scales - the total energy of the explosion, and the amount of that energy that is emitted as observable light, or radiation. "In a typical supernova, the radiation is less than 1 per cent of the total energy. But in SN2016aps, we found the radiation was five times the explosion energy of a normal-sized supernova.