The two oldest supernovae known to humans have been found, according to new research found from the Canada-France-Hawaii telescope on Mauna Kea in Hawaii.

These supernovae, both estimated to be about 11 billion years old are impressive in their age. Considering the universe is approximately 13.7 billion years old, they have found some of the first stars ever formed.

Both were named as type IIn supernovae, which occur when stars larger than the sun explode. This explosion sends matter into space, radiation is released, and as a result, it’s seen as a flash of colourful light from Earth.

Instead of using traditional measures – that is, taking telescopic images from the sky and comparing them to others at specific time intervals – the researchers combined images from months of research and stacked them on top of one another, allowing them to see flashes of light in an easier fashion.

“If you stack all of those images into one big pile, then you can reach deeper and see fainter objects,” University of California researcher and lead author Jeff Cooke pointed out in the release. “It’s like in photography when you open the shutter for a long time. You’ll collect more light with a longer exposure.”

Comparing these to the same sky in previous years, they found the faint flashes occurred in a small period of time, deeming it the supernovae. Further observations confirmed this.

The study and findings are published in this week’s issue of the journal Nature.

Click here to read the full study.

Image courtesy of NASA/CXC/M.Weiss

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