February 28, 1996
The cosmos has been expanding since the beginning of time, making room for galaxies, for stars, for planets — and ultimately, for you.
Explosions Discovered Near Galactic Center
Birthday · February 28, 1996
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APOD published February 28, 1996. Full image credits are on the original APOD entry below. A publication-date match, not a photo taken on your date. Independent of NASA.
Tremendous explosions near the center of our Galaxy were discovered just this past December and are being announced today by a paper in Nature and a press conference at NASA. Bursts like these have never been seen before, and so the exact cause is unknown and will likely be the source of astronomical speculations and observations for years to come. Much more powerful than any explosions we humans can create, these eruptions likely involve the extreme conditions found only on the surface of a neutron star in a binary system, possibly similar to the X-ray binary system depicted in the above drawing. The new source, dubbed GRO J1744-28 for its discovery spacecraft and position, currently produces multiple pulsed bursts of energy per day, each of which last several seconds. The bursts are quite prominent in X-ray light. Discovery team leaders include Chryssa Kouveliotou (USRA) and Gerald Fishman (NASA /MSFC).