"What If is an epic exploration of possibilities. What If is a Webby Award-winning science web series that takes you on a journey through hypothetical worlds and possibilities, some in distant corners ...

A massive burst of gamma rays produced by the explosion of a star almost two billion light-years away was so powerful that it changed Earth’s atmosphere, according to scientists. Gamma rays are ...

The gamma-ray burst (GRB) occurred two billion light-years from Earth and illuminated much of the galaxy. Images of the rare and powerful cosmic phenomenon show a halo and "bullseye" like shapes.

26 issue of the journal Nature. In the past four years, the team of astronomers working at the Smithsonian's Fred Lawrence Whipple Observatory in Arizona has observed high-energy gamma-ray bursts ...

that here on Earth we typically detect strong gamma-ray bursts only from the detonation of nuclear bombs. The earth's atmosphere blocks most gamma rays from space, so gamma-ray astronomy was not ...

Earth would be vulnerable to intense UV radiation, which would devastate microorganisms like algae. This could lead to ecosystem collapse and a potential mass extinction event. Gamma-ray bursts ...

The signal from the gamma ray burst, dubbed GRB 221009A, had been traveling for about 1.9 billion years before it reached Earth, making it among the closest known "long" GRBs, whose initial ...

The event, a gamma-ray burst, was detected by a space telescope and a NASA observatory. A team of scientists including University of Leicester physicists described the minute-long blast as a rare ...