Astronomers have found a wierd new object in our Milky Method galaxy.
A world workforce reported Wednesday that this celestial object – maybe a star, pair of stars or one thing else completely – is emitting X-rays across the similar time it is capturing out radio waves. What’s extra, the cycle repeats each 44 minutes, at the very least in periods of maximum exercise.
Situated 15,000 light-years away in a area of the Milky Method brimming with stars, fuel and mud, this object could possibly be a extremely magnetized lifeless star like a neutron or white dwarf, Curtin College’s Ziteng Andy Wang stated in an e mail from Australia.
A celestial object – maybe a star, pair of stars or one thing else completely – is emitting X-rays across the similar time it is capturing out radio waves.
NASA/Chandra/Spitzer/MeerKat through AP
Or it could possibly be “one thing unique” and unknown, stated Wang, lead writer of the examine revealed within the journal Nature.
NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory noticed the X-ray emissions by probability final yr whereas specializing in a supernova remnant, or the stays of an exploded star. Wang stated it was the primary time X-rays had been seen coming from a so-called long-period radio transient, a uncommon object that cycles by radio alerts over tens of minutes.
Given the unsure distance, astronomers cannot inform if the bizarre object is related to the supernova remnant or not. A single light-year is 5.8 trillion miles.
The hyperactive section of this object – designated ASKAP J1832091 – appeared to final a couple of month. Exterior of that interval, the star didn’t emit any noticeable X-rays. That would imply extra of those objects could also be on the market, scientists stated.
“Whereas our discovery would not but resolve the thriller of what these objects are and should even deepen it, learning them brings us nearer to 2 potentialities,” Wang stated. “Both we’re uncovering one thing completely new, or we’re seeing a identified sort of object emitting radio and X-ray waves in a means we have by no means noticed earlier than.”
Launched in 1999, Chandra orbits tens of 1000’s of miles (kilometers) above Earth, observing a number of the hottest, high-energy objects within the universe.
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