The number of strange signals from space is on the rise
1) Recently, there has been evidence of new strange signals
from space. Nature Magazine (
https://go.nature.com/3ANWfmD)
reports that an international research team led by Professor
Li Di and Dr. Wang Pei of the National Astronomical
Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (NAOC) has
recorded the largest set of events to date FRB - the so-called fast
radio bursts, received in record time from just one unknown source
in deep space. Such signals were first caught in 2007. They are
characterized by a very powerful burst of energy that takes
milliseconds. Until last year, FRB signals were thought to be
sporadic, but recent observations show that many of them actually
repeat themselves with a certain cycle. Scientists hope that such a
large packet set will finally allow determining the characteristics
of the energy, including its distribution, of FRB signals. And the
data obtained can be applied to other similar signals, which,
ultimately, should shed light on the nature of these mysterious
signals. The researchers emphasize that the FRB 121102 event is
the first space "repeater" known to us. Scientists have traced the
signals and determined that a dwarf galaxy is the likely source.
The huge amount of signals received from there indicates that some
kind of "permanent radio source" is located in this galaxy.
2) Astronomers in the framework of the radio survey of the sky with
the ASKAP telescope discovered a variable source of highly polarized
radiation, the nature of which is still a mystery. The properties of
ASKAP J173608.2-321635 do not fit into the models of stars, neutron
stars or X-ray binaries, but they do fit a completely new class of radio
sources. A preprint of the work is available at arXiv.org. Ziteng Wang
from the University of Sydney, together with other astronomers,
discovered the compact variable radio source ASKAP J173608.2-321635,
which was observed six times between January 2020 and September
2020 as part of the ASKAP VAST-P1 survey at a frequency of 888
megahertz and is located within 4 degrees from the center of the Milky
Way in its plane. Analysis of the data available to astronomers made it
possible to exclude stars, ordinary neutron stars and X-ray binaries from
possible sources of radiation.
