Tag: FRB

Close, But No FRB

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There was a report about a month ago that a Fast Radio Burst (FRB) produced a repeating signal.  This is big news because we really don’t know what causes FRBs, and once they have ended it can be difficult to trace their source.  But a repeating signal means we can pinpoint their origin and potentially figure out their root cause.  It’s no wonder the astronomical community was excited…and skeptical. Most of the FRBs that have been discovered were in archival data – data from past surveys that were given a closer look.  Only a few have been seen in real-time, so when...

Universe Radio on Repeat

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Looking at the universe in radio waves is a fascinating sight.  For one, the radio sky is very weak; If you placed your cellphone on the Moon facing back at Earth, it would be brighter than all other radio sources in the entire sky by a factor of a million.  But as with every other part of the electromagnetic spectrum, it has scientific value in studying the sky.  Over the past decade, astronomers have been identifying several Fast Radio Bursts (FRB), short bursts of radio waves from different places in the universe that last for a few short seconds.  These are...