Astronomers that witnessed a Type Ia supernova said they caught a glimpse of the powerful supernova by detecting nothing.

The Type Ia supernova occurred in a galaxy called Messier 82 and was detected by astronomers using the Chandra X-ray Observatory .

Messier 82, otherwise called the Cigar Galaxy, is a starburst galaxy about 12 million light years away in the Ursa Major constellation.

Like Us on Facebook

It's five time more luminous than our Milky Way galaxy and a hundred times more luminous than other galaxies.

The Type Ia supernova in Messier 82 was possibly triggered by a white dwarf that absorbed too much mass from its companion star.

Astronomers searching for the exact location of the supernova were unable to detect the source since the region around the site of the supernova was devoid of material.

Rafaella Margutti of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics said even though it might sound odd, astronomers learned a great deal about the supernova by detecting nothing.

She said they can now rule out the explosion was caused by a white dwarf that continuously pulled material from a companion star.

Margutti said the supernova called SN 2014J might have been formed by the merger of two white dwarfs, a phenomena that results in little or no X-rays after an explosion.

Atish Kamble, one of the astronomers involved in the study, said eliminating the possible explanation for the cause of the SN 2014J explosion is a big step. The next step is to narrow further reasons for the explosion.

Astronomers said Type Ia supernovae are used as cosmic-distance markers. Supernovae are considered a key in discovering the universe's accelerated expansion.

The supernova that occurred at Messier 82 gives scientists the chance to observe details that would be hard to detect in more distant supernova.

Jerod Parrent, another astronomer involved in the study, said the SN 2014J explosion could be a chance of lifetime to study a supernova up close and personal.