People have witnessed supernovae for millennia, but what threat do they pose to life on Earth? This video is sponsored by Brilliant. You can get started for free, or the first 200 people to sign up via https://brilliant.org/veritasium get 20% off a yearly subscription.
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A massive thanks to Prof. Hans-Thomas Janka for helping us with the physics of supernovae and GRBs. A massive thanks to Prof. Brian Thomas for all of his help with the terrestrial effects of supernovae and GRBs. This video would not have been possible without them. Also thanks to Dr. Luke Barnes for his initial help with the literature search.
Hydrogen bomb vs Supernova fact was taken from this great article by xkcd/Randall Munroe – https://what-if.xkcd.com/73/ (based on the calculation by Andrew Karam, 2002)
Cosmic bubble footage from
https://www.cfa.harvard.edu/news/1000-light-year-wide-bubble-surrounding-earth-source-all-nearby-young-stars
Neutrino driven SN explosion simulations from https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/2041-8205/808/2/L42
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References:
Melott, A. et al. (2019). Hypothesis: Muon radiation dose and marine megafaunal extinction at the End-Pliocene supernova. Astrobiology, 19(6), 825-830. – https://ve42.co/Melott1
Thomas, B. C. et al. (2016). Terrestrial effects of nearby supernovae in the early Pleistocene. The Astrophysical Journal Letters, 826(1), L3 – https://ve42.co/Thomas1
Melott, A. L., & Thomas, B. C. (2019). From cosmic explosions to terrestrial fires?. The Journal of Geology, 127(4), 475-481. – https://ve42.co/Melott2
Fields, B. et al. (2019). Near-Earth supernova explosions: Evidence, implications, and opportunities. arXiv preprint arXiv:1903.04589. – https://ve42.co/Fields1
Thomas, B. C., Atri, D., & Melott, A. L. (2021). Gamma-ray bursts: not so much deadlier than we thought. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 500(2), 1970-1973. – https://ve42.co/Thomas2
Melott, A. et al. (2004). Did a gamma-ray burst initiate the late Ordovician mass extinction?. International Journal of Astrobiology, 3(1), 55-61. – https://ve42.co/Melott3
Firestone, R. B. (2014). Observation of 23 supernovae that exploded less than 300 pc from Earth during the past 300 kyr. The Astrophysical Journal, 789(1), 29. – https://ve42.co/firestone1
Janka, H. T. (2017). Neutrino emission from supernovae. arXiv preprint arXiv:1702.08713. – https://ve42.co/Janka1
Janka, H. T., & Hillebrandt, W. (1989). Neutrino emission from type II supernovae-an analysis of the spectra. Astronomy and astrophysics, 224, 49-56. – https://ve42.co/Janka2
Janka, H. T. (2017). Neutrino-driven explosions. arXiv preprint arXiv:1702.08825. – https://ve42.co/Janka3
Karam, P. A. (2002). Gamma and neutrino radiation dose from gamma ray bursts and nearby supernovae. Health physics, 82(4), 491-499. – https://ve42.co/Karam1
Melott, A. L., Thomas, et al.. (2017). A supernova at 50 pc: effects on the Earth's atmosphere and biota. The Astrophysical Journal, 840(2), 105. – https://ve42.co/Melott4
Ludwig, P., et al. (2016). Time-resolved 2-million-year-old supernova activity discovered in Earth's microfossil record. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 113(33), 9232-9237. – https://ve42.co/Ludwig1
Gritschneder, et al. (2011). The supernova triggered formation and enrichment of our solar system. The Astrophysical Journal, 745(1), 22. – https://ve42.co/Gritschneder1
Motizuki, Y., Takahashi, et al. (2009). An Antarctic ice core recording both supernovae and solar cycles. arXiv preprint arXiv:0902.3446. – https://ve42.co/Motizuki
Zucker, C. et al. (2022). Star formation near the Sun is driven by expansion of the Local Bubble. Nature, 601(7893), 334-337. – https://ve42.co/Zucker1
Hirata, K. et al.(1987). Observation of a neutrino burst from the supernova SN1987A. Physical Review Letters, 58(14), 1490. – https://ve42.co/Hirata1
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Written by Petr Lebedev & Derek Muller
Edited by Fabio Albertelli
Animation by Fabio Albertelli, Jakub Misiek, Alex Drakoulis, Ivy Tello, Mike Radjabov, and Charlie Davies
Filmed by Derek Muller
Additional Research by Kovi Rose & Katie Barnshaw
Video/photos supplied by NASA, ESA, Pond5, and Getty Images
Music from Epidemic Sound & Jonny Hyman
Produced by Derek Muller, Petr Lebedev, and Emily Zhang
Kinda like drawing a vacuum. The lack of pressure becomes exponentially greater. I wonder if there's a correlation?🫤
@LuffyGotDrip Says:
Awesome
@sulochandhungel Says:
How can nutrinos can reach the earth, earlier than photons?
@TheMan-ud2wq Says:
Your first analogy was so ridiculous lol
@avadhutatre Says:
Thanks
@newfreenayshaun6651 Says:
That first picture from jwst that was so awesome shows a fast moving black hole, something that 10 years before I was really hoping wasn't real
@j.dragon651 Says:
Where did all the heavy elements that make up most of our solar system besides the sun come from? They didn't come from Sol They had to be born in stars somewhere? Were those stars close by? Asking for a friend.
@chb2551 Says:
The collision of 2 Neutron Stars has recently started being called a Kilonova. It's strength is much higher than even a Hypernova. It was 1st seen in 2017. One of the biggest differences is that its gravity waves can be detected, as well as the light and gamma radiation.
Then you have the most powerful explosion ever recorded that happened in 2022. GRB221009A was many times more powerful than any explosion ever recorded previously. The amount of very-high-energy photons collected from Gamma Ray Bursts, since they started recording them, is only a few hundred. This 1 explosion that took place about 2.4 billion light-years away allowed scientists to collect over 5,000 VHE photons.
That just shows how massively powerful this explosion was. It had more of an effect on the atmosphere than any other previously recorded explosion. To the point where it could be compared to solar flares from our own star, even though it was from something 2 billion light-years away. I haven't seen what they've decided to quantify it as, though, since it's clearly many times stronger than the Kilonova recorded in 2017.
It had more photon energy, even at this distance, than the Large Hadron Collider can produce. It's been nicknamed the BOAT, or Brightest Of All Time. Just this last month they found that it actually did come from a star exploding and not from a massive gas collapse into a Super Massive Black Hole, like they'd originally thought. It's crazy to imagine how large that star had to be. It was something that you'd only be able to see once every 10k years or so, and we just happened to be here to see it.
@thadoc6824 Says:
Wait. The sun ends up over time converting from hydrogen to eventually iron. But the iron core will be 1.4x the mass of the sun? How does that work? Or is it 1.4x the mass of the currenr iron core?
@joeypancakeguy Says:
From dust to dust as the saying goes - that's what we came from. I still can't believe we are so lucky as a species to exist and we can't stop wars between us and protect our life sustaining environment. I just hope we are still around for at least ten millenniums. Who knows maybe then we'll be so advanced that we'll see clearly that it is possible to peacefully coexist.
- Hopeful Human
@luxmatrix2619 Says:
Hi
@salahh89 Says:
Wonderful and intimidating universe..
@Ray199149 Says:
You will not have enough time to write your last words lol...
@lucian2559 Says:
Gamma ray burst: what if i hit earth?
@JRS2025 Says:
can brightness physically hurt?
@JanasOdyssey Says:
Hey I have really big doubt. Einstein says gravity is not a force it is space time curvature. Sun will be alive when fusion force is pushing outwards and gravity pushing to the center of sun if both forces are equal then sun will alive. If there is no fuel then gravity crushes the sun then we have supernova. Here if gravity is not a force according to Einstein what is it crushes sun.
@CraftedLeah4545 Says:
we die
@theanimatedmoneyshow9111 Says:
My head hurts
@OldMacDonaldHadAFarmEIEIO Says:
NEUTRINO GANG
@JDogVids Says:
To sum up the video: We'd be completely and uttery f*cked.
@Frazful Says:
Wow brilliant video
@Flare7639 Says:
Neutrinos be like: power of friendship
@JanRubes-ds3kt Says:
What you mean by saying stars that Will create black hole don't go supernova??? They do! Wtf??
@errolanthonyrespicio9420 Says:
I watch your videos to help me sleep. It’s very relaxing for me
@sunuwarpravakar6176 Says:
I think.. For us Mother Earth dwellers, Our existence will remain if we could build spaceship as fast as light speed or create a worm hole using f..king amount of energy.
I think universe is highly dynamic beyond our imagination.
@priyangshugoswami9833 Says:
Good thing neutrinos react very rarely, otherwise supernovae wouldn't be so rare.
@Smokyjamvr2 Says:
What about a kilonova
@MattyIcecubes Says:
Fast forward to 2024 and Betelgeuse is acting kinda funny. We might be on the verge of witnessing it's supernova; and it would be a phenomal month long sight. If it happens soon that means Betelgeuse exploded right around the middle of the 13th century.
@someasiandude4797 Says:
One day god is gonna accidentally spill his coffee on the book of physics opened to neutrinos and the universe will light up like the 4th of July
@urskrik6353 Says:
This actually did happen just recently. And a new star is gonna be born in 9 months!
@Xaniker Says:
I think we'd die.
@jeffreymars8062 Says:
Jimi Hendrix?
@niri2506 Says:
Yes our Sun is going to explode. And we might be the first people in 12000 years to witness this event. The solar micronova is coming and it's coming fast.
@declanvan1775 Says:
I watched every single video it's amazing 🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩
@insanedevan7957 Says:
I thought he was gunna pull a vsause and say " the sun is not going to explode..... Or is it? *Vsause sound*"
@waynehewett4017 Says:
Depending on how far away the star is ....
We are ether going to ok and have a fireworks show ....
Or we are totally screwed and all life on earth is dead ....
With nothing pretty much in between.....
@Kiolan29 Says:
Welp short answer, we also go boof
@veenmikki27 Says:
My seventh grade ass the moment I hear “Johannes Kepler” 😭
@dakota8189 Says:
Someone plz tell me how we know empty space has 1 million hydrogen atoms, but not around our solar system. Like how
@weichaozhang2555 Says:
people when they name different stars and planets: Oh look, a blue star lets name it IOAW 98734 OH LOOK a red planet, lets name it OIWUTOINSOG989G89EGE
@Bill-uf6os Says:
I am taking iron supplements. Amazing 🤩
@00Jay215 Says:
I think this is all pretty damn cool that we know this if real, but I can't see anyway in hell we could possibly know this much information. Someone of this HAS to be a good guess but there no way we are sure. Or are we?
@SunnyIlha Says:
What would *happen* if??
🛑✋🫨
@SunnyIlha Says:
*How* near. 😳
@yehosuasimon4629 Says:
Hi there, at first I would say you are one of my favorite channel on YouTube, I’m watching your content every day, and I wanted to ask you if you could add an auto translate Subtitles to Hebrew it will be the best!!🙏🏻🫶
@khushaljogur Says:
Great video.
@Den-ux5qq Says:
Your work is awesome
@LibaneseGurl Says:
Subhanallah ❤
@alanborges4392 Says:
It was not mentioned that another form of gamma explosion is when the Hulk claps.
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