Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs) are quick and powerful eruptions of cosmic radio waves that have so far defied understanding. But this latest observation might just change that.
Astronomers using the Green Bank Telescope in West Virginia found the most comprehensive record of an FRB ever recorded. The observation indicates that the burst comes from a highly magnetized region of space outside of the Milky Way, maybe a supernova or a strongly star-forming nebula.
"We now know that the energy from this FRB passed through a dense, magnetized region shortly after it formed," Kiyoshi Masui, lead author of this research said in a statement. "This significantly narrows down the source's environment and type of event that triggered the burst."
According to the study, published in Nature, the burst is located no further than 9 billion light-years from the Milky Way. The data shows that the burst, called FRB 110523, went through two plasma regions on its way to Earth, the first one extending for over 900 million miles (1.5 billion kilometers). There are no astronomical sources belonging to the Milky Way that have the characteristics of the regions seen near the burst.
The first plasma “screen” has to lie within 100,000 light-years of the source, to produce the dispersion observed by the team. This makes the source and the first plasma regions part of the same galaxy. Based on these considerations, the researchers were able to exclude stellar flare produced in the Milky Way.
"Taken together, these remarkable data reveal more about an FRB than we have ever seen before and give us important constraints on these mysterious events," concluded Masui.
The most likely explanation for FRB 110523 is that the source (maybe a supernova or a magnetar) is located either in a dense nebula or near the center of its host galaxy.
Other types of FRB have been suggested to form when a black hole swallows a neutron star whole, while others, called perytons, were discovered to be produced when people open microwaves ovens before the countdown has reached zero.
