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This is a list of the brightest natural objects in the sky. This list orders objects by apparent magnitude from Earth , not anywhere else . This list is with reference to naked eye viewing; all objects are listed by their visual magnitudes, and objects too close together to be distinguished are listed jointly.
GRB 080319B was a gamma-ray burst (GRB) detected by the Swift satellite at 06:12 UTC on March 19, 2008. The burst set a new record for the farthest object that was observable with the naked eye: [2] it had a peak visual apparent magnitude of 5.7 and remained visible to human eyes for approximately 30 seconds. [3]
It was the first quasar ever to be identified and is the visually brightest quasar in the sky as seen from Earth, with an apparent visual magnitude of 12.9. [2] The derived distance to this object is 749 megaparsecs (2.4 billion light-years). The mass of its central supermassive black hole is approximately 886 million times the mass of the Sun.
It also had the brightest UVOT afterglow ever recorded once corrected for extinction. [46] It had the largest amount of energy ever recorded in the TeV range, [47] and had the most energetic photons ever recorded for a GRB, peaking at 18 TeV. [25] [20] The burst was ten times brighter than any previous GRB detected by the Swift mission. [48]
APM 08279+5255 was initially identified as a quasar in 1998 during an Automatic Plate Measuring Facility (APM) survey to find carbon stars in the galactic halo.The combination of its high redshift (z=3.87) and brightness (particularly in the infrared) made it the most luminous object yet seen in the universe.
The universe’s brightest object is a quasar in a distant galaxy that’s powered by the fastest-growing black hole ever recorded, according to a new study.
"light detected from the object had the highest energy ever observed: 1 Tera electron volt (TeV) -- about one trillion times as much energy per photon as visible light"; [29] "the brightest light ever seen from Earth [to date]"; [32] "this detection is considered a milestone in high-energy astrophysics". [33]
The European Southern Observatory spotted the object, J0529-4351, during a 1980 sky survey, but it was thought to be a star. It was not identified as a quasar — the extremely active and luminous ...