Supernovas, the catastrophic explosions that follow the collapse of a star, are essential to our understanding of the cosmos. They serve as the yardstick we use to measure vast distances across space. And it was observations of supernovas, in fact, that allowed astronomers in 1998 to uncover that the universe is expanding at an accelerating rate.

But much about them remains a mystery. Since they happen in an instant, witnessing the actual moment of the explosion has been tricky.

Now, in a new study published in the journal Science Advances, an international team of astronomers say they’ve gotten the earliest and most detailed peek yet at one of these stellar blasts right as one unfolded.

In observations made with the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope, the astronomers

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