The most distant fast radio burst ever found came from a small, young galaxy
A clear account of what a fast radio burst is and why this one surprised astronomers.
Astronomers used South Africa's MeerKAT radio telescope and the James Webb Space Telescope to trace the most distant fast radio burst seen to date, FRB 20240304B, to a galaxy as it was just 3 billion years after the Big Bang, according to a paper published October 8 in Science. Fast radio bursts are millisecond-long flashes of radio emission whose cause is still uncertain. The host galaxy is surprisingly small and young, which suggests galaxies can produce these bursts soon after they start forming stars. "It was not what we were expecting," said co-author Ben Stappers of the University of Manchester.
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Fast radio burst
After exploring UK astronomers help reveal host galaxy of most distant fast radio burst, for what these flashes are, see Fast radio burst.
A radio flash lasting from a fraction of a millisecond to a few seconds, caused by a process not yet understood. An average one releases as much energy in a millisecond as the Sun does in three days, yet the signal reaching Earth is 1,000 times weaker than a phone on the Moon.
Wikipedia · Swim · 30 min
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MeerKAT
After exploring UK astronomers help reveal host galaxy of most distant fast radio burst, the telescope that caught it is MeerKAT.
A 64-antenna radio telescope in South Africa's Northern Cape, launched in 2018 inside a radio-quiet zone and folded into the first phase of the Square Kilometre Array.
Wikipedia · Wade · 5 min
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