A team of scientists in which the National Institute of Astrophysics (INAF) also participates has observed the brightest burst of gamma rays in the optical bands that has ever been detected. Gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are the most violent explosive phenomena in the Universe; this was detected at a comfortable 12 billion light years away (so it happened 12 billion years ago). The energy of the GRBs is magnified by being concentrated in two collimated jets.
Stefano Covino, a researcher at INAF in Milan and the only Italian among the authors of the study, points out that each burst of gamma rays (including this one) has such peculiar characteristics that scientists are tempted to make it a case in its own right: “Every event GRB shows original behaviors, but in general we find that even the extreme cases still fall within the same phenomenology”. Interesting until at arm’s length.