From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Chronological list of developments in knowledge and records
Timeline of
neutron stars ,
pulsars ,
supernovae , and
white dwarfs
Note that this list is mainly about the development of knowledge, but also about some supernovae taking place. For a separate list of the latter, see the article
List of supernovae . All dates refer to when the supernova was observed on Earth or would have been observed on Earth had powerful enough telescopes existed at the time.
Timeline
185 –
Chinese astronomers become the first to record observations of a
supernova ,
SN 185 .
1006 –
SN 1006 , a
magnitude −7.5 supernova in the constellation of
Lupus , is observed throughout Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.
1054 – Astronomers in Asia and the
Middle East observe
SN 1054 , the
Crab Nebula supernova explosion.
1181 – Chinese astronomers observe the
SN 1181 supernova.
1572 –
Tycho Brahe discovers a supernova (
SN 1572 ) in the constellation
Cassiopeia .
1604 –
Johannes Kepler 's supernova,
SN 1604 , in
Serpens is observed.
1862 –
Alvan Graham Clark observes
Sirius B .
1866 –
William Huggins studies the
spectrum of a
nova and discovers that it is surrounded by a cloud of
hydrogen .
1885 – A
supernova ,
S Andromedae , is observed in the
Andromeda Galaxy leading to recognition of supernovae as a distinct class of novae.
1910 – the spectrum of
40 Eridani B is observed, making it the first confirmed
white dwarf .
1914 –
Walter Sydney Adams determines an incredibly high
density for
Sirius B .
1926 –
Ralph Fowler uses
Fermi–Dirac statistics to explain
white dwarf stars.
1930 –
Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar discovers the
white dwarf maximum mass limit.
1933 –
Fritz Zwicky and
Walter Baade propose the
neutron star idea and suggest that
supernovae might be created by the collapse of normal stars to neutron stars—they also point out that such events can explain the
cosmic ray background .
1939 –
Robert Oppenheimer and
George Volkoff calculate the first
neutron star models.
1942 – J.J.L. Duyvendak,
Nicholas Mayall , and
Jan Oort deduce that the
Crab Nebula is a remnant of the
1054 supernova observed by Chinese astronomers.
1958 –
Evry Schatzman ,
Kent Harrison ,
Masami Wakano , and
John Wheeler show that white dwarfs are unstable to inverse
beta decay .
1962 –
Riccardo Giacconi ,
Herbert Gursky , Frank Paolini, and
Bruno Rossi discover
Scorpius X-1 .
1967 –
Jocelyn Bell and
Antony Hewish discover radio pulses from a
pulsar ,
PSR B1919+21 .
1967 – J.R. Harries,
Kenneth G. McCracken , R.J. Francey, and A.G. Fenton discover the first
X-ray transient (Cen X-2).
1968 –
Thomas Gold proposes that
pulsars are rotating
neutron stars .
1969 –
David H. Staelin , Edward C. Reifenstein,
William Cocke ,
Mike Disney , and
Donald Taylor discover the
Crab Nebula pulsar thus connecting
supernovae ,
neutron stars , and
pulsars .
1971 –
Riccardo Giacconi ,
Herbert Gursky ,
Ed Kellogg , R. Levinson, E. Schreier, and H. Tananbaum discover 4.8 second X-ray pulsations from
Centaurus X-3 .
1972 –
Charles Kowal discovers the
Type Ia supernova
SN 1972e in
NGC 5253 , which would be observed for more than a year and become the basis case for the type,
1974 –
Russell Hulse and
Joseph Taylor discover the binary
pulsar
PSR B1913+16 .
1977 –
Kip Thorne and
Anna Żytkow present a detailed analysis of
Thorne–Żytkow objects .
1982 –
Donald Backer ,
Shrinivas Kulkarni ,
Carl Heiles ,
Michael Davis , and
Miller Goss discover the
millisecond pulsar
PSR B1937+214 .
1985 –
Michiel van der Klis discovers 30 Hz quasi-periodic oscillations in GX 5-1.
1987 –
Ian Shelton discovers
SN 1987A in the
Large Magellanic Cloud .
2003 – first double binary pulsar,
PSR J0737−3039 , discovered at
Parkes Observatory .
2006 –
Robert Quimby and P. Mondol discover
SN 2006gy (a possible
hypernova ) in
NGC 1260 .
2017 – first observation of
neutron star merger , accompanied with
gravitational wave signal
GW170817 , short
gamma-ray bursts
GRB 170817A , optical transient
AT 2017gfo and other electromagnetic signals.
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References
Formation Fate In binary systems Properties Related
Types Single pulsars Binary pulsars Properties Related Discovery Satellite investigation Other
Classes Physics of Related Progenitors Remnants Discovery Lists Notable Research