as in supernova
astronomy
a star that suddenly increases greatly in brightness and then within a few months or years becomes less bright again
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Recent Examples of nova
Even though novas are exceptionally bright, supernovas are brighter—reaching billions of times brighter than the sun at their peak.
—
Elizabeth Gamillo, Smithsonian Magazine, 3 July 2025
Recorded live at the Lincoln Center, the band plays a bossa-nova take on the song while Gaga sings solo, wearing one of Cher’s own wigs.
—Kristen S. Hé, Vulture, 19 Mar. 2025
To get a separate measure of how unusual this is, the researchers placed 8 million novas around the center of the galaxy, with the distribution being random but biased to match the galaxy's brightness under the assumption that novas will be more frequent in areas with more stars.
—John Timmer, Ars Technica, 27 Sep. 2024
Elizabeth Gamillo, Smithsonian Magazine, 3 July 2025
Recorded live at the Lincoln Center, the band plays a bossa-nova take on the song while Gaga sings solo, wearing one of Cher’s own wigs.
—Kristen S. Hé, Vulture, 19 Mar. 2025
To get a separate measure of how unusual this is, the researchers placed 8 million novas around the center of the galaxy, with the distribution being random but biased to match the galaxy's brightness under the assumption that novas will be more frequent in areas with more stars.
—John Timmer, Ars Technica, 27 Sep. 2024
Recent Examples of Synonyms for nova
Noun
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The Lynx play with unshakable swagger and intense focus, from supernova Collier to sharpshooting Kayla McBride to the tenacious Stud Budz.—
Steven Louis Goldstein,
New York Times,
13 Sep. 2025
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Sure, other fates are possible, like direct collapse to a black hole or explosions through the pair-instability mechanism, but a core-collapse supernova (also known as a type II supernova) represents the fate of the majority of the most massive stars ever to be born.—
Ethan Siegel,
Big Think,
12 Sep. 2025
Noun
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The characteristics of the supernova's hot gas, combined with the motion of the pulsar, allowed the team to determine the age of the system and its distance more precisely.—
Robert Lea,
Space.com,
2 Sep. 2025
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Instead of the familiar pulsing heartbeat of a typical pulsar, this source emitted a steady radio signal, unusually compact and highly polarized.—
New Atlas,
New Atlas,
29 Aug. 2025
Noun
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Gravitational lensing occurs when a massive object sits between Earth and a background source — in this case, RXJ1131-1231 and its quasar.—
Robert Lea,
Space.com,
27 Aug. 2025
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As such, quasars are among the most powerful beacons astronomers can use to probe distant regions of the universe.—
Lee Billings,
Scientific American,
18 June 2025
Noun
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Computations weren't merely limited to simple figures, though; the Cat also allowed users to store the result of a computation to a variable and reference that variable in other computations.—
Cameron Kaiser,
ArsTechnica,
12 Sep. 2025
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That definitely plays a little bit of a variable into it.—
Joe Smith,
New York Times,
10 Sep. 2025
Noun
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Skywatchers on Saturday night will be treated to the gorgeous sight of a waxing crescent moon close to Antares, an unmistakably bright red supergiant star shining in the south.—
Jamie Carter,
Forbes.com,
29 Aug. 2025
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Its mass is between 10 and 15 times the mass of our sun; again, typical for a red supergiant.—
Keith Cooper,
Space.com,
13 Aug. 2025
Noun
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In the 10 years since then, scientists have detected hundreds of black holes coming together, as well as other extreme cosmic events like neutron stars colliding and black holes merging with a neutron star.—
Nell Greenfieldboyce,
NPR,
11 Sep. 2025
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In this kind of system, scientists theorize that the black hole tears the neutron star apart before swallowing it, which releases electromagnetic waves.—
Chad Hanna,
The Conversation,
10 Sep. 2025
Noun
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Meta's first supercluster, called Prometheus, is slated to go live in 2026.—
Kurt Knutsson,
FOXNews.com,
21 July 2025
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Zuckerberg said Meta’s first supercluster is called Prometheus, and that the company is building several other multi-gigawatt clusters.—
Ashley Capoot,
CNBC,
14 July 2025
Cite this Entry
“Nova.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/nova. Accessed 15 Sep. 2025.
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