Weird Star Sends Fast Radio Burst That Beats Like a Heartbeat Billions of Light-Years Away From Earth

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology's astronomers has detected recurrent radio signals from a distant galaxy.

The scientists hypothesized that a specific kind of star may be the source by equating the signals to the sound of a heartbeat.

According to researchers, the source's precise position is unknown. Still, the galaxy is millions of light-years away. The distance covered by light in one year, or a light-year, is 5.88 trillion miles.

FRBs are a recently found phenomenon that was first identified in 2007. FRBs, as their name implies, are powerful radio emissions that often flare up in a distant region of the universe for just a brief period before disappearing from view, according to Newsweek.

MIT Astronomers Detect Fast Radio Burst From Star's "Heartbeat"

Fast radio bursts usually have a millisecond duration. The latest study, released in the Nature journal on Wednesday, claims that the newly discovered signal, FRB 20191221A, is nearly three seconds long - over 1,000 times longer than usual.

The study shows that the longest-lasting FRB to date, 20191221A, also features the most distinct periodic pattern seen thus far. BGR claims that scientists are unsure about the precise origin of the radio emission. It either belongs to a magnetar or a radio pulsar. The highly compact and quickly spinning collapsed cores of massive stars are known as neutron stars, and both are neutron stars.

Because these two are the most well-known instances of objects that produce these signals, scientists assume that it is one of these two. The researchers claim that this heartbeat-like signal is nearly like a pulsar or magnetar on steroids since it is so busy.

Fast Radio Burst From Star's "Heartbeat" Repeats Every 0.2 Seconds

Astronomers who were keeping an eye on data from the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment (CHIME) on Dec. 21, 2019, discovered the signal that drew their attention.

After closer examination, Michilli and his colleagues discovered the signal included a distinct periodic pattern, reiterating every 0.2 seconds and resembling a heartbeat.

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"Not only was it very long, lasting about three seconds, but there were periodic peaks that were remarkably precise, emitting every fraction of a second - boom, boom, boom - like a heartbeat," Michilli said in an MIT press release.

Distant Neutron Star to Blame on Weird Fast Radio Burst?

Magnetars and radio pulsars are two examples of dependable and predictable signals found in our galaxy, according to Michilli (per Business Insider). A magnetar is a dying, dense star with a magnetic field that is extraordinarily strong.

A pulsar is a spinning remnant of an exploding star that releases narrow radio wave beams that go past Earth like a lighthouse's beacon. These reliably recurring signals are used by astronomers to explore our hypotheses and learn more about the cosmos, according to Michilli.

Scientists believe that the explosion originates from a distant neutron star based on its regularity. Some of the universe's densest objects are neutron stars, collapsing remains of dead stars.

Magnetic Fields Explained

David Kaplan, an astrophysicist at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, explained to Gizmodo that magnetic fields could occasionally become entangled, resulting in an otherwise constant pulse of radio signals becoming intermittent or ceasing to exist altogether.

In contrast to radio emissions from pulsars and magnetars in the Milky Way, FRB 20191221A looks to be more than a million times brighter, according to the MIT press release.

The researchers might be able to comprehend the mysterious bursts' origins if the radio source continues to produce outbursts. Hopefully, FRB 20191221A will stay more consistent than its other mysterious siblings.