4 radio emissions Earth received from space in 2024

If the thought of receiving radio signals from space conjures up an image of Jodie Foster in the film contacthunched over a computer console and listening to spacecraft blueprints relayed to Earth by Vega’s intelligent beings, this is, um, a decent first step towards understanding what scientists have in mind when they tune into space radio signals. The reality is less cinematic, but that doesn’t make it boring.

Radio telescopes – the most famous The Arecibo observatory in Puerto Ricobut also peppered in the deserts all over the world – they are not really to detect deliberate communication signals from aliens. It would be like saying that the eyes on your head are to detect rabid grizzly bears. It wouldn’t be a misnomer, but that’s not a description of why I’m here.

In fact, radio telescopes are really a bit like the eyes on your head, in that they are less listening, as the term “radio” suggests, and more. seeing what is sometimes called “sky radio,“which means everything detectable in the broad spectrum of emissions emitted by the cosmos itself from Earth’s point of view – things like pulsar beacons, solar flares and their effectsand the microwave background radiation of the universe. But the radio sky also includes signals from closer to home like space probes, as well as the satellites that orbit around us.

In 2024, radio receivers on and around the human world are picking up a variety of fascinating emissions, some of which are mysterious, none of which are likely to be from space invaders, and all of which are more interesting than fiction. Here are five of the most intriguing signs of 2024:

A mysteriously slow pulse

Taken by the Australian Square Kilometer Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) radio telescope, this signal known as ASKAP J193505.1 + 214841.0 was spotted earlier this year, but the team that found it has published its results. in June 2024. This is a deeply puzzling radio signal in that it repeats itself almost every hour – every 53.8 minutes to be more precise. It is too slow to be something that astronomers currently understand.

The gap between the ASKAP J193505.1 + 214841.0 emissions is too slow to be a pulsar, as pulsars emanate from rapidly spinning neutron stars – literally achieving drill bit-like RPMs. The length of this newly discovered gap has puzzled scientists until now, but every new discovery about nature begins as the discovery of something that should be “impossible”.

A powerful and distant burst

Imagine “looking” at the radio sky (we’re talking figuratively here). To a radio stargazer, bursts of radio waves known as fast radio bursts (FRBs) may appear as rapid blinding flashes that momentarily drown out all other signals before quickly disappearing. FRB 20220610A is one such powerful radio burst – one that is found to have traveled through space for 8 billion years before being detected. He is old; the Big Bang was 13.8 billion years ago.

FRB 20220610A is not only – also detected by ASKAP, this time with the help of the Hubble Space Telescope – one of the most distant FRBs ever detected, but it is also one of the “brightest” (actually). the most energetic) bursts of radio signals never picked up by humanity’s receivers. The source may have been a place in space with “as many as seven galaxies on a possible path of fusion”. according to a NASA blog post about the discovery.

Radio pollution by Elon Musk

Researchers in the recent past have already complained about the problematic signals emitted by the more than 6,000 Starlink satellites operated by SpaceX that orbit the Earth, transmitting data to Internet users here on the Earth’s surface. The signal emanating from the satellites represents unwanted noise to some instruments trying to observe the radio sky. However, researchers at the LOFAR observatory in the Netherlands discovered in 2024 that the new line of V2-mini satellites emits. up to 32 times more unwanted noise than previous Starlink models.

Starlink noise obscures astronomers’ observations of certain low-frequency signals necessary for the study of exoplanets, black holes, and ancient cosmic phenomena. It is not intended for the law to intervene and protect radio telescopes from such noise. Radio quiet zones exist for their benefit, but these zones are policed ​​for things like interference from nearby mobile phones, and they have nothing to say about objects launched into space. Satellite-based radio broadcasts are an unregulated frontier, and Starlink has launched about 6,000 satellites into that regulatory void. Thanks as usual, Elon!

Another FRB with important clues for scientists

Another FRB sheds light on the mysterious origins of massive radio signal bursts in 2024. This is a cool find from the study of phenomena called magnetars – in this case magnetar SGR 1935 + 2154, which actually fired his intriguing signal in 2020. After pinpointing the source of magnetar SGR 1935+2154, the Caltech’s Deep Synoptic Array-110 (DSA-110) team now says that such signals come from neutron stars in massive star-shaped galaxies that are rich in metals. This discovery significantly reduces the chances of finding neutron stars with FRB-creating attributes, which means that our understanding of where these extreme events occur has become more precise.