Professor Brian Metzger contributes to NASA’s First Detection of Heavy Element From Star Merger!

October 26, 2023

Columbia University Professor of Physics, Brian Metzger, was a recent co-author on a paper that contributed theoretical interpretation to the James Webb Space Telescope's first observation of a kilonova after a gamma-ray burst! A research group has used space and ground-based telescopes, including NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, and NASA’s Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, to observe an exceptionally bright gamma-ray burst, GRB 230307A, and identify the neutron star merger that generated an explosion that created the burst. 

To read the full article please see here:  https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-023-06759-1