Strange “circle radio waves” that puzzled scientists in 2020 may be related to space explosions in distant galaxies from events such as black hole mergers or “stellar explosions”When many stars suddenly form.
A new peer-reviewed study published this week in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society,
These radio waves are a unique phenomenon and which had no clear scientific explanation.
At the time of the discovery, the researchers were using the Australian Radio Telescope ASKAP. unusual phenomenon observed by (Australian Square Kilometer Array Pathfinder) and named it “Weird Radio Circles” (or OCR, weird radio circleacronym in english) precisely because of its uniqueness.
Now, with the study being released and a new image captured by the Dark Energy Survey Astronomical Observation Project that superimposes data from the South African Radio Astronomy Observatory’s Meerkat radio telescope, scientists believe in two main theories that make up circular waves. Explains: They could be the remnants of a big explosion, Like the merger of two supermassive black holes, or a. outcome of sudden stellar explosion (starburst), Episodes in which millions of stars are suddenly born.
“The circles are likely to be large bursts of hot gas, some one million light-years from the central galaxy,” Professor Ray Norris, from the University of West Sydney’s School of Science, said in his column in the journal. Conversation.
Artist’s representation of ‘Weird Radio Circles’. Scientists believe it took 1 billion years for them to reach the size we see them today. – Photo: CSIRO
The researchers explain that the merging event of two black holes releases enormous amounts of energy, enough to generate an ORC, but it is a starburst event. Also considered a possibility as such an event causes hot gas to escape from the Milky Way, Which will cause a circular shock wave.
“Both black hole mergers and starburst events are rare, which explains why orcs are so rare (only five have been reported so far),” he recalls.
Jordan Collier, a researcher at the Inter-University Institute for Data-Intensive Astronomy, which compiled the image of the meerkat data, said in an interview with Australian scientific research body CSIRO that astronomers should keep looking at these strange radio circles for more clues. is required. about its origin.
“People often want to interpret their observations and show that they align with the best of our knowledge. To me, it’s more exciting to discover something new that challenges our current understanding,” Collier said.
till now, ORC detected only with radio telescopes, Scientists cannot capture the event using optical, infrared or X-ray telescopes.
“We need an even more sensitive instrument than Meerkat and ASKAP. Fortunately, the global astronomical community is building one such observatory – the Square Kilometer Array (SKA), an international effort with telescopes in South Africa and Australia.
Curious about black holes?
See more in the report and video below:
Understand how the first image of a black hole was formed
Astronomers observe black hole’s ‘breakfast’ for the first time
Black hole swallows ‘Super Jupiter’
