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Magnetars, a type of neutron star believed to have an extremely powerful magnetic field, could be the source of some fast radio bursts, new research suggests.
Although much research has aimed to explain the mysterious phenomenon, the source has so far remained elusive and the subject of some debate.
On April 28, 2020, a team of approximately 50 students, postdocs and professors from the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment (CHIME) Fast Radio Burst Collaboration detected an unusually intense radio burst coming from a nearby magnetar located in the Milky Way.
In a study in Nature, show that the intensity of the radio burst (FRB) was three thousand times greater than that of any magnetar measured up to that point, giving weight to the theory that magnetars are at the origin of at least some FRBs.
“We calculated that such an intense explosion from another galaxy would be indistinguishable from some fast radio bursts, so this really gives weight to the theory that suggests that magnetars may be behind at least some FRBs,” says co-author Pragya Chawla, one senior doctoral student in the physics department of McGill University.
FRBs were first discovered over a decade ago. Originally considered singular events, astronomers have since discovered that some of these high-intensity bursts of radio emissions – more intense than the energy generated by the sun over millions or billions of years – actually repeat themselves.
One theory speculated that FRBs were extragalactic magnetars, extremely magnetic young neutron stars that occasionally glow to release enormous amounts of energy.
“Until now, all FRBs detected by telescopes like CHIME were in other galaxies, which makes them quite difficult to study in great detail,” says co-author Ziggy Pleunis, a senior doctoral student in the physics department. ‘Furthermore, the magnetar theory was not supported by observations of magnetars in our galaxy as they were found to be far less intense than the energy released by the extragalactic FRBs until now.
“However, given the large energy and activity gaps between the brightest and most active FRB sources and what is observed for magnetars, perhaps younger, more energetic and active magnetars are needed to explain all the FRB observations,” adds Paul. Scholz of the Dunlap Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics at the University of Toronto.
Evidence of a smoking gun of magnetar origin for some FRBs comes from the simultaneous detection of an extragalactic radio discharge and a burst of X-rays.
Source: McGill University
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