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posted by Fnord666 on Wednesday October 10 2018, @01:19PM   Printer-friendly
from the cosmic-accelerators dept.

Submitted via IRC for Bytram

Newly detected microquasar gamma-rays 'call for new ideas': Cosmic accelerator in the Milky Way could help explain more extreme events at the centers of distant galaxies

The first-ever detection of highly energetic radiation from a microquasar has astrophysicists scrambling for new theories to explain the extreme particle acceleration. A microquasar is a black hole that gobbles up debris from a nearby companion star and blasts out powerful jets of material.

"What's amazing about this discovery is that all current particle acceleration theories have difficulties explaining the observations," said Hui Li, a theorist in Los Alamos National Laboratory's Theoretical Division who served on the team. "This surely calls for new ideas on particle acceleration in microquasars and black hole systems in general."

The team's observations, described in the Oct. 4 issue of the journal Nature, strongly suggest that particle collisions at the ends of the microquasar's jets produced the powerful gamma rays. Scientists think that studying messages from this microquasar, dubbed SS 433, may offer a glimpse into more extreme events happening at the centers of distant galaxies.

A. U. Abeysekara, et. al. Very-high-energy particle acceleration powered by the jets of the microquasar SS 433. Nature, 2018; 562 (7725): 82 DOI: 10.1038/s41586-018-0565-5


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  • (Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @07:34PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 10 2018, @07:34PM (#747098)

    Is it possible that God is fucking with scientists?

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