What is a gamma-ray burst?
You may not have heard of the phenomenon known as a gamma-ray burst (GRB), but these things – short-lived bursts of gamma-ray photons, the most energetic form of light – are the most luminous events known in the universe since the Big Bang and they shine hundreds of times brighter than a typical supernova and about a million trillion times as bright as the sun. So they are pretty special, although they are detected once or twice per day from wholly random directions of the sky.
I saw a television programme recently which featured GRBs and I wanted to know more. There’s a short tutorial on the subject here and a short computer animation [which takes a while to load] here.