Situated in the area of Westbury, NY, Valerie Varnuska is a nature enthusiast. During her free time, Valerie Varnuska enjoys relaxing in natural settings such as the beach. She is also fond of studying astronomy. Supernovas cause some of the biggest explosions, with each blast showering extreme brightness and setting off random motions of gases in the darkness of space. While supernovas are caused by various events, a well-understood explanation for many observed supernovae in astronomy is a dying star. Stars, including the sun, are nuclear power reactors in space that fuse atoms of core matter and convert them into energy (heat and light). At the centers of massive stars, heat generates pressure which counteracts the effects of gravity and stops stars from collapsing. Extreme gravity tries to squeeze the stars into the tiniest possible bits, while outward pressure prevents this. When a star burns up all its nuclear fuel, which will eventually occur at some point in time, it cools off, and pressures drop, resulting in inevitable squeezing by gravity. These collapses occur at rapid speeds, triggering large shock waves. Shock waves cause the outer parts of the star to explode into an expanding cloud of hot gases. However, at the star's core, gravity would have squeezed matter into the densest known objects in the universe known as black holes. Black holes are only created when the exploding star is at least 10 times the size of our sun.