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The biggest explosion ever seen has been spotted in space – and scientists don’t know for sure where it came from. The blast was brighter than almost anything ever seen and has been going on for years, making it by far the most powerful such event witnessed by scientists. It has been ongoing for more than three years, and took place nearly 8 billion years away. Astronomers have proposed a host of possible explanations for the blast: it may be a vast cloud of gas that was torn apart by a black hole, for instance. But nothing on such a scale has ever been seen before and the explosion may have come from something else entirely. It is more than 10 times brighter than any known supernova and three times brighter than the brightest tidal disruption event, where a star falls into a supermassive black hole. The explosion, known as AT2021lwx, took place when the universe was around six billion years old, and is still being detected by a network of telescopes. The astronomers, led by the University of Southampton, believe the explosion is a result of a vast cloud of gas, possibly thousands of times larger than our sun, that has been violently disrupted by a supermassive black hole. Fragments of the cloud would be swallowed up, sending shockwaves through its remnants, as well as into a large dusty “doughnut” surrounding the black hole. Such events are very rare and nothing on this scale has been witnessed before, the researchers say. Last year, astronomers witnessed the brightest explosion on record – a gamma-ray burst known as GRB 221009A. Although this was brighter than AT2021lwx, it lasted for just a fraction of the time, meaning the overall energy released by the AT2021lwx explosion was far greater. AT2021lwx was first detected in 2020 by the Zwicky Transient Facility in California, and subsequently picked up by the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) based in Hawaii. But until now the scale of the explosion had been unknown. Dr Philip Wiseman, research fellow at the University of Southampton, who led the research, said: “We came upon this by chance, as it was flagged by our search algorithm when we were searching for a type of supernova. “Most supernovae and tidal disruption events only last for a couple of months before fading away. For something to be bright for two plus years was immediately very unusual.” The Southampton-led team believe the most feasible explanation for what caused the explosion is an extremely large cloud of gas (mostly hydrogen) or dust that has come off course from its orbit around the black hole and been sent flying in. Dr Wiseman added: “With new facilities, like the Vera Rubin Observatory’s Legacy Survey of Space and Time, coming online in the next few years, we are hoping to discover more events like this and learn more about them. “It could be that these events, although extremely rare, are so energetic that they are key processes to how the centres of galaxies change over time.” The findings are published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. Additional reporting by agencies Read More Scientists think they have explained a ‘mysterious structure in the universe’ Astronomers spot the largest cosmic explosion ever seen Astronomers see ‘objects that no one has ever seen before’ in incredible observations Astronomers spot the largest cosmic explosion ever seen Astronomers see ‘objects that no one has ever seen before’ in incredible observations ‘Meteorite? shooting star? missile?’: Officials explain strange ‘fireball’ over Japan

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The viral "Chalkboard Mom" from 2012 has come back with an update on her daughter Laikynn, and social media is loving it. McKinli Hatch had the now famous photo to her blog Mommy's Little Sunshine over ten years ago, whilst she was pregnant with her daughter. The photo shows Hatch standing next to a chalkboard that lists the potential names for her daughter: Taylee, McKarty, Nayvie, and Maylee, all crossed out, with the circled "Lakynn" at the bottom. Hatch's unique name choice has ingrained herself, and her daughter, into internet culture, and 11 years later, we've been given an update. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Hatch posted a video of her and Laikynn at the beach with the caption "throw back to my first viral photo". The text overlay in the video reads: "The people realise you are the 'Chalk Board Mom' and Laikynn is now 11 years old." Viewers seemingly loved the throwback as the jokes about Hatch's choice of spelling resurfaced a decade later. @mckinli Throw back to my first viral photo ? "I named my daughter Mcieckaealeighphla (pronounced like Lauren) because of you," one viewer joked. "My daughter is Saighlaur (pronounced Mary of course) so I completely get it!" Many said that Hatch was "iconic" for bringing us back for an update. The TikTok even made its way over to Twitter, with many feeling nostalgic for the original meme: Some also noticed that Laikynn's name is spelled with an extra 'I' than the original name: But one user explained the reason behind the extra 'i': The original blog has seemingly been inactive since 2016, but Hatch has since grown a sizeable following on TikTok, posting fashion content as well as documenting her experience as a single mum. Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

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