A never-before-seen 'chirp' in the light of an exploding star has revealed new clues about the engine powering some of the brightest supernovae in the Universe. According to an analysis of the unprecedented signal, a superluminous supernova named SN 2024afav was most likely the violent birth of a magnetar – a rapidly spinning, extremely magnetic neutron star whose environment is 'wobbling' due to an effect predicted by general relativity . The event, says a team led by astrophysicist Joseph