´óÏó´«Ã½

The expanding bipolar shell of the helium nova V445 Puppis.

Sometimes the title of a doesn't really do things justice. Translating things into journalistic shorthand (essential when talking to busy producers) what we have here is a "rumbling time-bomb vampire-star about to unlock the secrets of the universe".

That's what this artist's impression shows and there's an impressive computer animation . Astronomers from the University of Warwick and others have been watching V445 for over two years now.

V445 Puppis is a star that sucks in matter from its companion star neighbour. Every now and again it gobbles up so much there is a massive nova explosion and V445 throws off this material at speeds up to 30 million miles an hour.

Watching this process allows astronomers to work out V445 is 25,000 light-years from us and is more than 10,000 times brighter than the Sun. This picture shows the first time-lapse image of the most recent observable explosion taken over two years. You can see the cloud of gases roaring away from the star over that time.

But there may well come a point where V445, a white dwarf star, gobbles up so much material from its companion that it will blow itself to bits. Astronomers would really like to see this as they think this would be a Type Ia supernova which would help answer some nagging questions about how the universe works. In particular the role of "dark energy" in the accelerating expansion of our universe.

As is the way the artist's impression looks even more impressive than the actual pictures. Until you realise the detail in the images from the are the telescopic equivalent of identifying a pound coin at a distance of 40 kilometres.

Much more information and .

• Bookmark with:
• |
• |
• |
• |
• - What's this?