GRB 070125 is a gamma-ray burst that occurred on 2007 January 25. It is unique in that it did not occur in a galaxy, but in intergalactic space. This is unusual, since GRBs are caused by hypernovae of young massive star

Star

A star is a massive, luminous sphere of plasma held together by gravity. At the end of its lifetime, a star can also contain a proportion of degenerate matter. The nearest star to Earth is the Sun, which is the source of most of the energy on Earth...

s, which usually means having to reside in a galaxy, as almost all stars are formed in galaxies, particularly high mass ones.

It is theorized that the star formed in the tidal tail resulting from the interaction of two nearby galaxies, deep in intergalactic space.

A month after it was detected, the Large Binocular Telescope

Large Binocular Telescope

Large Binocular Telescope is an optical telescope for astronomy located on Mount Graham in the Pinaleno Mountains of southeastern Arizona, and is a part of the Mount Graham International Observatory...

observed a 26th magnitude optical afterglow from the gamma ray burst

Sources

• Sky and Telescope, "A Gamma-Ray Burst Out of Nowhere", 18 December 2007 (accessed 18 June 2008)