Astronomy News
Unveiling Images of "Supernova SN 2025rbs"
by Thai Astronomers taken from NARIT's Telescope Network
The National Astronomical Research Institute of Thailand (NARIT), under the Ministry of Higher Education, Science, Research and Innovation (MHESI), has released images of the new supernova, SN 2025rbs, 45.6 million light-years from Earth. It was first discovered on July 14, 2025, using the Gravitational-wave Optical Transient Observer (GOTO) and subsequently captured by NARIT's 0.7-m telescope of the Thai Robotic Telescope network (TRT), located at Sierra Remote Observatories (SRO) in California, the United States.
On July 14, 2025, Dr. Samaporn Tinyanont, a high-energy astrophysics researcher, used NARIT's 0.7-meter telescope at SRO to capture images of the new supernova, SN 2025rbs, after another independent discovery by the GOTO project in La Palma, Spain just hours prior. Dr. Kanthanakorn Noysena, an astronomer from NARIT, is also on the GOTO discovery team [1]. These NARIT-affiliated observations independently confirm the discovery of SN 2025rbs just five hours apart.
The 0.7-meter telescope at SRO in the United States, used by Dr. Samaporn Tinyanont to observe and capture the image of the supernova, is part of NARIT's network of four automated telescopes (Thai Robotic Telescopes: TRTs) installed in Australia, Chile, China, and the United States. TRTs make it possible for astronomers to observe the night sky continuously at any given time. Dr. Samaporn Tinyanont is utilizing this capability to survey near-Earth galaxies within a radius of 40 million parsecs (approximately 130 million light-years) to search for new supernovae in collaboration with the DLT40 (Distance Less Than 40 Mpc) network from the University of Arizona and the University of California, Davis.
On another side of the globe, the 0.4-meter telescope, located on La Palma Island in the Atlantic Ocean, Spain, is one of the telescopes in the GOTO project, with the primary purpose to study gravitational waves. It consists of two sets of eight telescopes operating simultaneously, surveying the sky at the same time in attempts to find any potential candidate for the optical counterpart of gravitational wave events. If the LIGO Gravitational Wave Observatory (LIGO) announces the discovery of a new gravitational wave source, GOTO can immediately capture images of the sky and compare them to identify any new light source within minutes. During the downtime awaiting for a new gravitational wave detection, GOTO continues to search for any other new transients in the sky.
NARIT has been continuously involved with GOTO since the installation of imaging equipment. In particular, NARIT stores and processes the massive amount of data from GOTO using "Chalawan Cluster," a high-performance computer system developed by NARIT's Astronomical Data Center for research in astrophysics, cosmology, and space weather. Dr. Kanthanakorn Noysena from NARIT is part of the GOTO's steering committee and was also a co-discoverer of this supernova.
SN 2025rbs is a Type Ia (pronounced "one a") supernova, formed by the explosion of a white dwarf in a binary system. It is of great importance in astronomy, as it serves as a "standard candle" for measuring distances to galaxies and is a key tool in studying the expansion of the universe. By studying the distances to galaxies using Type Ia supernovae, astronomers have discovered that the universe is expanding at an accelerated rate. This led to a major astronomical discovery known today as "dark energy" which earned Saul Perlmutter, Brian P. Schmidt, and Adam G. Riess the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics.
The discovery of this new supernova by the network of telescopes affiliated with NARIT demonstrates the need for continued development of automated telescope networks to allow Thai astronomers to be able to make discoveries in this fast-moving field.
Such surveys also drive the development of data storage, processing, and analysis for Big Data Science. NARIT has now established an Information Technology Center for High Performance Computing (HPC) and the National Astronomical Data Center, one of the largest astronomical databases in Thailand, to process and store the vast amounts of data astronomers encounter on a regular basis.
The new discovery in astronomy often drives the development of advanced research equipment and tools, which ultimately drives technological advancement and social development. Here, it is evident that the drive to search for a tiny bright spot from a distant star exploding in the sky can inspire fundamental change of a nation relatively unheard of in astronomy mere decades ago. Thailand is now part of the world-class GOTO network and boasts a global network of robotic telescopes developed and operated by Thai researchers and engineers. For this same reason, NARIT has always been committed to the idea of using difficult astronomical challenges to develop technology and human capability for Thai society.
Reference [1] https://www.wis-tns.org/object/2025rbs