A study recently published in Nature reported that the supernova star that was first spotted back in 1572 and recorded by Tycho Brahe had been seen yet again by Max Planck Institute scientists.

The latter, using telescopes in Hawaii and Spain, managed to capture images of the centuries old explosion, which were reflected by interstellar dust.

Now, astronomers are hoping that these findings will help them solve the mystery of the 400-year-old explosion that left observers throughout the world dazzled at that time.

The supernova star appeared in early November 1572 in the constellation Cassiopeia and it was visible during the day, as well. Its exact position was recorded by Tycho Brahe in his “Stella Nova” book, revealing that the star was located somewhere far beyond the moon. This came into stark contrast with the Aristotelian theory about the immutability of the heavens, which had been the belief and the tradition followed by the western world for almost 2000 years. From that moment on, the door to the innovative works of Johannes Kepler, Galileo Galilei and Isaac Newton was opened, who revolutionized science through their discoveries.

Max Planck Institute scientists are now hoping to determine the precise type of the star, which has been long classified as a type Ia supernova, drawing on historic records.
This type of supernovae are said to appear when a white dwarf star is subject to a thermonuclear explosion, which renders material from the celestial object to be pushed into the outer space at up to 18,000 miles per second.

Oliver Krause, of the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, Germany, along with his team, used the waves of light that the original explosion gave rise to, which are still mirrored by interstellar dust particles, in order to study the 1572 event.

Their two telescopes at the Calar Alto observatory, Spain, and at Mauna Kea, Hawaii captured an optical spectrum of the star at nearly maximum brightness, which made the scientists conclude that the celestial object was a normal type Ia supernovae.