Part one of term paper
A is a STAR that explodes. It suddenly increases in brightness by a factor of many billions, and within a few weeks it slowly fades. In terms of the human lifespan, such explosions are rare occurrences. In our Milky Way galaxy, for example, a may be observed every few hundred years. Three such explosions are recorded in history: in 1054, in ...

Part two of term paper
... The most interesting supernova of recent times was detected in the relatively nearby Large MAGELLANIC CLOUD, on Feb. 23, 1987, by an astronomer at Chile's Las Campanas Observatory. It quickly became an object of intense study by all the means available to modern astronomy. A supernova may radiate more energy in a few days than the Sun does in 100 million years, and the energy expended in ejecting material is much greater even than this. In many cases, including the Crab nebula supernova, ...