Double-detonation supernova could explain why the universe is full of candles

Astroboffins have found the first evidence of a double-detonated Type Ia supernova, which could explain why we have enough bright points of reference in the skies to plot our place in the universe.

Data from the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope (VLT) on SNR 0509-67.5 – a supernova 160,000 light-years from Earth, caused when a white dwarf star hit critical mass and exploded – reveals that the elements created suggest something may have triggered the star to explode ahead of time.

Supernovae like these are very luminous and referred to as "standard candles" in astronomy. As fixed points, they are used to measure the expansion of the universe, but there are a lot more of them than current theories would predict, and new data could explain why.

"The explosions of white dwarfs play a crucial role in astronomy," said Priyam Das, a PhD student at the University of ...