NASA scientists may be getting closer to unraveling the mystery of extreme radio events in space. Two of the space agency’s X-ray telescopes captured a dead star releasing a rapid burst of radio waves, shedding light on this phenomenon.
The radio burst, lasting just a fraction of a second, emitted as much energy as the sun does in a year. This discovery, detailed in a new study published in the journal Nature, revealed that the dead star emitted a laser-like beam of light, rather than a chaotic explosion.
Before this observation, scientists struggled to pinpoint the origin of fast radio bursts, as they are brief and often come from outside our galaxy. However, in 2020, the remains of a collapsed star, known as a magnetar, produced a short, intense radio burst within our galaxy.
A second burst occurred in October 2022, also from the same magnetar. NASA’s telescopes, NICER and NuSTAR, captured these fleeting events.
George Younes, a researcher at Goddard and member of the NICER science team, emphasized the significance of these observations: “We’ve unquestionably observed something important for our understanding of fast radio bursts.”
The latest burst occurred between two “glitches,” where the magnetar suddenly spins faster. Despite being only about 12 miles across and spinning at 3.2 times per second, the magnetar slowed down to less than its pre-glitch speed in just nine hours, surprising scientists.
Chin-Ping Hu, lead author of the study, noted the unusual rapidity of this change, suggesting a connection to the generation of fast radio bursts.
As researchers delve into the factors behind these bursts, Younes acknowledges there is still much to learn: “I think we still need a lot more data to complete the mystery.”