Researchers have demonstrated that dead stars can produce powerful flashes of light through the force of gravity itself, and understanding the phenomenon could shed new light on some of the universe’s largest and most mysterious explosions.
Neutron Star Black Hole
Neutron stars, despite their name, aren’t completely neutral: They retain some electric charge, which, combined with the star’s rapid rotation, can generate incredibly huge magnetic fields — the fastest of them spin faster than a kitchen blender — and in some cases, the most powerful magnetic fields in the universe.
The combination of a strong magnetic field and an ultra-strong gravitational environment could lead to strange new physics, the researchers explained in a paper uploaded to a preprint database. arXiv
One intriguing new possibility the researchers explored is the ability of neutron stars to emit huge amounts of light for short periods of time, the source of which could be a star. gravity
Related: Physicists hope to use gravitational waves to ‘see’ the beginning of time
In the case of neutron stars, it is strong magnetic field
However, a rapidly rotating neutron star Gravitational waves
If the wave frequency is right, it can amplify a photon, which then travels down a series of complex paths to generate even more photons directly from the gravitational field, a process that grows and grows until it collapses, emitting a burst of radiation.
The researchers say the following strange celestial explosions Gamma-ray burst Fast Radio Burst
The researchers used the flashes of known neutron stars to put limits on the relationship between gravity and light, demonstrating how these powerful explosions act as natural laboratories for testing some of the universe’s most unexpected interactions.
