No one can predict where the next gamma-ray burst will come from, but one or two will erupt every day in the sky. They typically last only a few tens of seconds.

ESA’s Integral gamma-ray observatory detects an average of about 10 GRBs a year. The spacecraft has also confirmed the existence of a new population of faint gamma-ray bursts, located in our cosmic neighbourhood. They are possibly generated the collapse of a massive star that does not present the characteristics of a supernova or hypernova, or by the merger of two white dwarfs (small and dense stars about the size of Earth), or by the merger of a white dwarf with a neutron star or a black hole.

Credits: ESA, illustration by ESA/ECF