Return of superstar supernova raises doubt about its identity
Brightest explosion’s resurgence suggests black hole mischief
A celebrity supernova appears to have come back for an encore — with hints that it might not be a supernova after all.
Last year, astronomers reported that a burst of light from about 3 billion light-years away was the brightest exploding star seen to date. After about 80 days of fading away, the cosmic flash (dubbed ASASSN-15lh) started to get bright again, researchers report online May 12 at arXiv.org. Another 80 days later, it was blasting out as much ultraviolet light as some other supernovas.