Fast radio burst
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radio astronomy Radio astronomy is a subfield of astronomy that studies celestial objects at radio frequencies. The first detection of radio waves from an astronomical object was in 1933, when Karl Jansky at Bell Telephone Laboratories reported radiation comin ...
, a fast radio burst (FRB) is a transient
radio Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30  hertz (Hz) and 300  gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a tr ...
pulse of length ranging from a fraction of a
millisecond A millisecond (from '' milli-'' and second; symbol: ms) is a unit of time in the International System of Units (SI) equal to one thousandth (0.001 or 10−3 or 1/1000) of a second and to 1000 microseconds. A unit of 10 milliseconds may be calle ...
to 3 seconds, caused by some high-energy astrophysical process not yet understood. Astronomers estimate the average FRB releases as much energy in a millisecond as the Sun puts out in three days. While extremely energetic at their source, the strength of the signal reaching Earth has been described as 1,000 times less than from a
mobile phone A mobile phone, cellular phone, cell phone, cellphone, handphone, hand phone or pocket phone, sometimes shortened to simply mobile, cell, or just phone, is a portable telephone that can make and receive calls over a radio frequency link whi ...
on the
Moon The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System and the largest and most massive relative to its parent planet, with a diameter about one-quarter that of Earth (comparable to the width of ...
. The first FRB was discovered by
Duncan Lorimer Duncan R. Lorimer (born 1969) is a British-born American astrophysicist. He is a professor of astronomy at West Virginia University, known for the discovery of the first fast radio burst in 2007. Discovery of fast radio burst The first fast radio ...
and his student David Narkevic in 2007 when they were looking through archival
pulsar A pulsar (from ''pulsating radio source'') is a highly magnetized rotating neutron star that emits beams of electromagnetic radiation out of its magnetic poles. This radiation can be observed only when a beam of emission is pointing toward Ea ...
survey data, and it is therefore commonly referred to as the Lorimer Burst. Many FRBs have since been recorded, including several that have been detected to repeat in seemingly irregular ways. Only one FRB has been detected to repeat in a regular way: FRB 180916 seems to pulse every 16.35 days. Most FRBs are extragalactic, but the first
Milky Way The Milky Way is the galaxy that includes our Solar System, with the name describing the galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars that cannot be individually distinguished by the naked eye. ...
FRB was detected by the CHIME radio telescope in April 2020. In June 2021, astronomers reported over 500 FRBs from outer space detected. When the FRBs are polarized, it indicates that they are emitted from a source contained within an extremely powerful
magnetic field A magnetic field is a vector field that describes the magnetic influence on moving electric charges, electric currents, and magnetic materials. A moving charge in a magnetic field experiences a force perpendicular to its own velocity and to ...
. The exact origin and cause of the FRBs is still the subject of investigation; proposals for their origin range from a rapidly rotating
neutron star A neutron star is the collapsed core of a massive supergiant star, which had a total mass of between 10 and 25 solar masses, possibly more if the star was especially metal-rich. Except for black holes and some hypothetical objects (e.g. w ...
and a
black hole A black hole is a region of spacetime where gravity is so strong that nothing, including light or other electromagnetic waves, has enough energy to escape it. The theory of general relativity predicts that a sufficiently compact mass can def ...
, to
extraterrestrial intelligence Extraterrestrial intelligence (often abbreviated ETI) refers to hypothetical intelligent extraterrestrial life. The question of whether other inhabited worlds might exist has been debated since ancient times. The modern form of the concept emerged ...
. In 2020, astronomers reported narrowing down a source of fast radio bursts, which may now plausibly include " compact-object mergers and magnetars arising from normal core collapse
supernova A supernova is a powerful and luminous explosion of a star. It has the plural form supernovae or supernovas, and is abbreviated SN or SNe. This transient astronomical event occurs during the last evolutionary stages of a massive star or whe ...
e". A neutron star has been proposed as the origin of an unusual FRB with periodic peaks lasting over 3 seconds reported in 2022. The localization and characterization in 2012 of
FRB 121102 In radio astronomy, a fast radio burst (FRB) is a transient radio pulse of length ranging from a fraction of a millisecond to 3 seconds, caused by some high-energy astrophysical process not yet understood. Astronomers estimate the average FRB ...
, one of the three repeating sources, has improved the understanding of the source class. FRB 121102 is identified with a galaxy at a distance of approximately three billion
light-year A light-year, alternatively spelled light year, is a large unit of length used to express astronomical distance, astronomical distances and is equivalent to about 9.46 Orders of magnitude (numbers)#1012, trillion kilometers (), or 5.88  ...
s and is embedded in an extreme environment. The first host galaxy identified for a non-repeating burst, FRB 180924, was identified in 2019 and is a much larger and more ordinary galaxy, nearly the size of the Milky Way. In August 2019, astronomers reported the detection of eight more ''repeating'' FRB signals. In January 2020, astronomers reported the precise location of a second repeating burst, FRB 180916. One FRB seems to have been in the same location as a known
gamma-ray burst In gamma-ray astronomy, gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are immensely energetic explosions that have been observed in distant galaxies. They are the most energetic and luminous electromagnetic events since the Big Bang. Bursts can last from ten millise ...
. On 28 April 2020, a pair of millisecond-timescale bursts (
FRB 200428 In radio astronomy, a fast radio burst (FRB) is a transient radio pulse of length ranging from a fraction of a millisecond to 3 seconds, caused by some high-energy astrophysical process not yet understood. Astronomers estimate the average FRB rel ...
) consistent with observed fast radio bursts, with a fluence of >1.5 million Jy ms, was detected from the same area of sky as the magnetar
SGR 1935+2154 SGR 1935+2154 (or SGR J1935+2154) is a soft gamma repeater (SGR) that is an ancient stellar remnant, in the constellation Vulpecula, originally discovered in 2014 by the Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory. Currently, the SGR-phenomena and the r ...
. Although it was thousands of times less intrinsically bright than previously observed fast radio bursts, its comparative proximity rendered it the most powerful fast radio burst yet observed, reaching a peak flux of either a few thousand or several hundred thousand janskys, comparable to the brightness of the radio sources
Cassiopeia A Cassiopeia A (Cas A) () is a supernova remnant (SNR) in the constellation Cassiopeia and the brightest extrasolar radio source in the sky at frequencies above 1 GHz. The supernova occurred approximately away within the Milky Way ...
and
Cygnus A Cygnus A ( 3C 405) is a radio galaxy, and one of the strongest radio sources in the sky. A concentrated radio source in Cygnus was discovered by Grote Reber in 1939. In 1946 Stanley Hey and his colleague James Phillips identified that the sour ...
at the same frequencies. This established magnetars as, at least, one ultimate source of fast radio bursts, although the exact cause remains unknown. Further studies support the notion that magnetars may be closely associated with FRBs. On 13 October 2021, astronomers reported the detection of hundreds of FRBs from a single system.


Detection

The first fast radio burst to be described, the Lorimer Burst FRB 010724, was found in 2007 in archived data recorded by the
Parkes Observatory Parkes Observatory is a radio astronomy observatory, located north of the town of Parkes, New South Wales, Australia. It hosts Murriyang, the 64 m CSIRO Parkes Radio Telescope also known as "The Dish", along with two smaller radio telescopes ...
on 24 July 2001. Since then, many FRBs have been found in previously recorded data. On 19 January 2015, astronomers at Australia's national science agency (
CSIRO The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) is an Australian Government agency responsible for scientific research. CSIRO works with leading organisations around the world. From its headquarters in Canberra, CSIRO ...
) reported that a fast radio burst had been observed for the first time live, by the Parkes Observatory. Many FRBs have been detected in real time by the CHIME radio telescope since it became operational in 2018, including the first FRB detected from within the Milky Way in April 2020.


Features

Fast radio bursts are bright, unresolved (pointsource-like), broadband (spanning a large range of radio frequencies), millisecond flashes found in parts of the sky. Unlike many radio sources, the signal from a burst is detected in a short period of time with enough strength to stand out from the noise floor. The burst usually appears as a single spike of energy without any change in its strength over time. The bursts last for several milliseconds (thousandths of a second). The bursts come from all over the sky, and are not concentrated on the plane of the Milky Way. Known FRB locations are biased by the parts of the sky that the observatories can image. Many have radio frequencies detected around 1400 MHz; a few have been detected at lower frequencies in the range of 400–800 MHz. The component frequencies of each burst are delayed by different amounts of time depending on the
wavelength In physics, the wavelength is the spatial period of a periodic wave—the distance over which the wave's shape repeats. It is the distance between consecutive corresponding points of the same phase on the wave, such as two adjacent crests, tr ...
. This delay is described by a value referred to as a dispersion measure (DM). This results in a received signal that sweeps rapidly down in frequency, as longer wavelengths are delayed more.


Extragalactic origin

The
interferometer Interferometry is a technique which uses the '' interference'' of superimposed waves to extract information. Interferometry typically uses electromagnetic waves and is an important investigative technique in the fields of astronomy, fiber o ...
UTMOST has put a lower limit of 10,000 kilometers for the distance to the FRBs it has detected, supporting the case for an astronomical, rather than terrestrial, origin (because signal sources on Earth are ruled out as being closer than this limit). This limit can be determined from the fact that closer sources would have a curved wave front that could be detected by the multiple antennas of the interferometer. Fast radio bursts have pulse dispersion measurements , much larger than expected for a source inside the Milky Way galaxy and consistent with propagation through an ionized plasma. Furthermore, their distribution is
isotropic Isotropy is uniformity in all orientations; it is derived . Precise definitions depend on the subject area. Exceptions, or inequalities, are frequently indicated by the prefix ' or ', hence '' anisotropy''. ''Anisotropy'' is also used to describ ...
(not especially coming from the galactic plane); consequently they are conjectured to be of extragalactic origin.


Origin hypotheses

Because of the isolated nature of the observed phenomenon, the nature of the source remains speculative. , there is no generally accepted single explanation, although a magnetar has been identified as a possible source. The sources are thought to be a few hundred kilometers or less in size, as the bursts last for only a few milliseconds. Causation is limited by the speed of light, about 300 km per millisecond, so if the sources were larger than about 1000 km, a complex synchronization mechanism would be required for the bursts to be so short. If the bursts come from cosmological distances, their sources must be very energetic. One possible explanation would be a collision between very dense objects like merging
black hole A black hole is a region of spacetime where gravity is so strong that nothing, including light or other electromagnetic waves, has enough energy to escape it. The theory of general relativity predicts that a sufficiently compact mass can def ...
s or
neutron star A neutron star is the collapsed core of a massive supergiant star, which had a total mass of between 10 and 25 solar masses, possibly more if the star was especially metal-rich. Except for black holes and some hypothetical objects (e.g. w ...
s. It has been suggested that there is a connection to
gamma-ray burst In gamma-ray astronomy, gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are immensely energetic explosions that have been observed in distant galaxies. They are the most energetic and luminous electromagnetic events since the Big Bang. Bursts can last from ten millise ...
s. Some have speculated that these signals might be artificial in origin, that they may be signs of
extraterrestrial intelligence Extraterrestrial intelligence (often abbreviated ETI) refers to hypothetical intelligent extraterrestrial life. The question of whether other inhabited worlds might exist has been debated since ancient times. The modern form of the concept emerged ...
, demonstrating veritable technosignatures. Analogously, when the first pulsar was discovered, it was thought that the fast, regular pulses could possibly originate from a distant civilization, and the source nicknamed "LGM-1" (for "little green men"). In 2007, just after the publication of the e-print with the first discovery, it was proposed that fast radio bursts could be related to hyperflares of magnetars. In 2015 three studies supported the magnetar hypothesis. The identification of first FRB from the
Milky Way The Milky Way is the galaxy that includes our Solar System, with the name describing the galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars that cannot be individually distinguished by the naked eye. ...
, which originated from the magnetar
SGR 1935+2154 SGR 1935+2154 (or SGR J1935+2154) is a soft gamma repeater (SGR) that is an ancient stellar remnant, in the constellation Vulpecula, originally discovered in 2014 by the Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory. Currently, the SGR-phenomena and the r ...
, indicates that magnetars may be one source of FRB. Especially energetic
supernova A supernova is a powerful and luminous explosion of a star. It has the plural form supernovae or supernovas, and is abbreviated SN or SNe. This transient astronomical event occurs during the last evolutionary stages of a massive star or whe ...
e could be the source of these bursts. Blitzars were proposed in 2013 as an explanation. In 2014 it was suggested that following
dark matter Dark matter is a hypothetical form of matter thought to account for approximately 85% of the matter in the universe. Dark matter is called "dark" because it does not appear to interact with the electromagnetic field, which means it does not ...
-induced collapse of pulsars, the resulting expulsion of the pulsar magnetospheres could be the source of fast radio bursts. In 2015 it was suggested that FRBs are caused by explosive decays of
axion An axion () is a hypothetical elementary particle postulated by the Peccei–Quinn theory in 1977 to resolve the strong CP problem in quantum chromodynamics (QCD). If axions exist and have low mass within a specific range, they are of interest ...
miniclusters. Another exotic possible source are
cosmic strings Cosmic strings are hypothetical 1-dimensional topological defects which may have formed during a symmetry-breaking phase transition in the early universe when the topology of the vacuum manifold associated to this symmetry breaking was not s ...
that produced these bursts as they interacted with the plasma that permeated the
early Universe The chronology of the universe describes the history and future of the universe according to Big Bang cosmology. Research published in 2015 estimates the earliest stages of the universe's existence as taking place 13.8 billion years ago, with ...
. In 2016 the collapse of the magnetospheres of Kerr–Newman black holes were proposed to explain the origin of the FRBs' "afterglow" and the weak gamma-ray transient 0.4 s after GW 150914. It has also been proposed that if fast radio bursts originate in black hole explosions, FRBs would be the first detection of
quantum gravity Quantum gravity (QG) is a field of theoretical physics that seeks to describe gravity according to the principles of quantum mechanics; it deals with environments in which neither gravitational nor quantum effects can be ignored, such as in the vi ...
effects. In early 2017, it was proposed that the strong magnetic field near a supermassive black hole could destabilize the current sheets within a pulsar's magnetosphere, releasing trapped energy to power the FRBs. Repeated bursts of FRB 121102 have initiated multiple origin hypotheses. A coherent emission phenomenon known as superradiance, which involves large-scale entangled quantum mechanical states possibly arising in environments such as
active galactic nuclei An active galactic nucleus (AGN) is a compact region at the center of a galaxy that has a much-higher-than-normal luminosity over at least some portion of the electromagnetic spectrum with characteristics indicating that the luminosity is not prod ...
, has been proposed to explain these and other associated observations with FRBs (e.g. high event rate, repeatability, variable intensity profiles). In July 2019, astronomers reported that ''non-repeating'' Fast Radio Bursts may not be one-off events, but actually FRB repeaters with repeat events that have gone undetected and, further, that FRBs may be formed by events that have not yet been seen or considered. Additional possibilities include that FRBs may originate from nearby stellar flares. A FRB with multiple periodic component peaks lasting over 3 seconds was reported in 2022. A neutron star has been proposed as the origin of this FRB.


Bursts observed

Fast radio bursts are named by the date the signal was recorded, as "FRB YYMMDD".


2007 (Lorimer Burst)

The first FRB detected, the Lorimer Burst FRB 010724, was discovered in 2007 when
Duncan Lorimer Duncan R. Lorimer (born 1969) is a British-born American astrophysicist. He is a professor of astronomy at West Virginia University, known for the discovery of the first fast radio burst in 2007. Discovery of fast radio burst The first fast radio ...
of
West Virginia University West Virginia University (WVU) is a public land-grant research university with its main campus in Morgantown, West Virginia. Its other campuses are those of the West Virginia University Institute of Technology in Beckley, Potomac State Coll ...
assigned his student David Narkevic to look through archival data taken in 2001 by the Parkes radio dish in Australia. Analysis of the survey data found a 30- jansky dispersed burst which occurred on 24 July 2001, less than 5 milliseconds in duration, located 3° from the
Small Magellanic Cloud The Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC), or Nubecula Minor, is a dwarf galaxy near the Milky Way. Classified as a dwarf irregular galaxy, the SMC has a D25 isophotal diameter of about , and contains several hundred million stars. It has a total mass of ...
. The reported burst properties argue against a physical association with the
Milky Way The Milky Way is the galaxy that includes our Solar System, with the name describing the galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars that cannot be individually distinguished by the naked eye. ...
galaxy or the Small Magellanic Cloud. The burst became known as the Lorimer Burst. The discoverers argue that current models for the free electron content in the Universe imply that the burst is less than 1 giga
parsec The parsec (symbol: pc) is a unit of length used to measure the large distances to astronomical objects outside the Solar System, approximately equal to or (au), i.e. . The parsec unit is obtained by the use of parallax and trigonometry, an ...
distant. The fact that no further bursts were seen in 90 hours of additional observations implies that it was a singular event such as a supernova or merger of relativistic objects. It is suggested that hundreds of similar events could occur every day and if detected could serve as cosmological probes.


2010

In 2010 there was a report of 16 similar pulses, clearly of terrestrial origin, detected by the
Parkes radio telescope Parkes may refer to: * Sir Henry Parkes (1815–1896), Australian politician, one of the earliest and most prominent advocates for Australian federation Named for Henry Parkes * Parkes, New South Wales, a regional town * Parkes Observatory, a rad ...
and given the name perytons. In 2015 perytons were shown to be generated when microwave oven doors were opened during a heating cycle, with detected emission being generated by the microwave oven's magnetron tube as it was being powered off.


2011

In 2015, FRB 110523 was discovered in archival data collected in 2011 from the Green Bank Telescope. It was the first FRB for which linear polarization was detected (allowing a measurement of Faraday rotation). Measurement of the signal's dispersion delay suggested that this burst was of extragalactic origin, possibly up to 6 billion light-years away.


2012

Victoria Kaspi of
McGill University McGill University (french: link=no, Université McGill) is an English-language public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Founded in 1821 by royal charter granted by King George IV,Frost, Stanley Brice. ''McGill Univer ...
estimated that as many as 10,000 fast radio bursts may occur per day over the entire sky.


FRB 121102

An observation in 2012 of a fast radio burst (FRB 121102) in the direction of
Auriga AURIGA (''Antenna Ultracriogenica Risonante per l'Indagine Gravitazionale Astronomica'') is an ultracryogenic resonant bar gravitational wave detector in Italy. It is at the Laboratori Nazionali di Legnaro of the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nuclea ...
in the northern hemisphere using the Arecibo radio telescope confirmed the extragalactic origin of fast radio pulses by an effect known as plasma dispersion. In November 2015, astronomer Paul Scholz at
McGill University McGill University (french: link=no, Université McGill) is an English-language public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Founded in 1821 by royal charter granted by King George IV,Frost, Stanley Brice. ''McGill Univer ...
in Canada, found ten non-periodically repeated fast radio pulses in archival data gathered in May and June 2015 by the Arecibo radio telescope. The ten bursts have dispersion measures and sky positions consistent with the original burst FRB 121102, detected in 2012. Like the 2012 burst, the 10 bursts have a plasma dispersion measure that is three times larger than possible for a source in the
Milky Way The Milky Way is the galaxy that includes our Solar System, with the name describing the galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars that cannot be individually distinguished by the naked eye. ...
Galaxy. The team thinks that this finding rules out self-destructive, cataclysmic events that could occur only once, such as the collision between two neutron stars. According to the scientists, the data support an origin in a young rotating
neutron star A neutron star is the collapsed core of a massive supergiant star, which had a total mass of between 10 and 25 solar masses, possibly more if the star was especially metal-rich. Except for black holes and some hypothetical objects (e.g. w ...
(
pulsar A pulsar (from ''pulsating radio source'') is a highly magnetized rotating neutron star that emits beams of electromagnetic radiation out of its magnetic poles. This radiation can be observed only when a beam of emission is pointing toward Ea ...
), or in a highly magnetized neutron star ( magnetar),Alt URL
/ref> or from highly magnetized pulsars travelling through asteroid belts, or from an intermittent
Roche lobe In astronomy, the Roche lobe is the region around a star in a binary system within which orbiting material is gravitationally bound to that star. It is an approximately teardrop-shaped region bounded by a critical gravitational equipotential, ...
overflow in a neutron star-
white dwarf A white dwarf is a stellar core remnant composed mostly of electron-degenerate matter. A white dwarf is very dense: its mass is comparable to the Sun's, while its volume is comparable to the Earth's. A white dwarf's faint luminosity comes ...
binary. On 16 December 2016 six new FRBs were reported in the same direction (one having been received on 13 November 2015, four on 19 November 2015, and one on 8 December 2015). this is one of only two instances in which these signals have been found twice in the same location in space. FRB 121102 is located at least 1150  AU from Earth, excluding the possibility of a human-made source, and is almost certainly extragalactic in nature. As of April 2018, FRB 121102 is thought to be co-located in a
dwarf galaxy A dwarf galaxy is a small galaxy composed of about 1000 up to several billion stars, as compared to the Milky Way's 200–400 billion stars. The Large Magellanic Cloud, which closely orbits the Milky Way and contains over 30 billion stars, is so ...
about three billion light-years from Earth with a low-luminosity
active galactic nucleus An active galactic nucleus (AGN) is a compact region at the center of a galaxy that has a much-higher-than-normal luminosity over at least some portion of the electromagnetic spectrum with characteristics indicating that the luminosity is not prod ...
, or a previously unknown type of extragalactic source, or a young neutron star energising a
supernova remnant A supernova remnant (SNR) is the structure resulting from the explosion of a star in a supernova. The supernova remnant is bounded by an expanding shock wave, and consists of ejected material expanding from the explosion, and the interstellar mat ...
. On 26 August 2017, astronomers using data from the Green Bank Telescope detected 15 additional repeating FRBs coming from FRB 121102 at 5 to 8 GHz. The researchers also noted that FRB 121102 is presently in a ''"heightened activity state, and follow-on observations are encouraged, particularly at higher radio frequencies"''. The waves are highly polarized and undergoes Faraday rotation, meaning "twisting" transverse waves, that could have formed only when passing through hot plasma with an extremely strong magnetic field. This rotation of polarized light is quantified by Rotation Measure (RM). FRB 121102's radio bursts have RM about 500 times higher than those from any other FRB to date. Since it is a repeating FRB source, it suggests that it does not come from some one-time cataclysmic event; so one hypothesis, first advanced in January 2018, proposes that these particular repeating bursts may come from a dense stellar core called a
neutron star A neutron star is the collapsed core of a massive supergiant star, which had a total mass of between 10 and 25 solar masses, possibly more if the star was especially metal-rich. Except for black holes and some hypothetical objects (e.g. w ...
near an extremely powerful magnetic field, such as one near a massive black hole, or one embedded in a
nebula A nebula ('cloud' or 'fog' in Latin; pl. nebulae, nebulæ or nebulas) is a distinct luminescent part of interstellar medium, which can consist of ionized, neutral or molecular hydrogen and also cosmic dust. Nebulae are often star-forming regio ...
. In April 2018, it was reported that FRB 121102 consisted of 21 bursts spanning one hour. In September 2018, an additional 72 bursts spanning five hours had been detected using a
convolutional neural network In deep learning, a convolutional neural network (CNN, or ConvNet) is a class of artificial neural network (ANN), most commonly applied to analyze visual imagery. CNNs are also known as Shift Invariant or Space Invariant Artificial Neural Netwo ...
. In September 2019, more repeating signals, 20 pulses on 3 September 2019, were reported to have been detected from FRB 121102 by the
Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope The Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope (FAST; ), nicknamed Tianyan (, lit. "Sky's/Heaven's Eye"), is a radio telescope located in the Dawodang depression (), a natural basin in Pingtang County, Guizhou, southwest China. FAST ...
(FAST). In June 2020, astronomers from Jodrell Bank Observatory reported that FRB 121102 exhibits the same radio-burst behavior ("radio bursts observed in a window lasting approximately 90 days followed by a silent period of 67 days") every 157 days, suggesting that the bursts may be associated with "the orbital motion of a massive star, a neutron star or a black hole". Subsequent studies by
FAST Fast or FAST may refer to: * Fast (noun), high speed or velocity * Fast (noun, verb), to practice fasting, abstaining from food and/or water for a certain period of time Acronyms and coded Computing and software * ''Faceted Application of Subje ...
of further activity, consisting of 12 bursts within two hours observed on 17 August 2020, supports an updated refined periodicity between active periods of 156.1 days. Related studies have been reported in October 2021. Further bursts, at least 300, were detected by FAST in August and September 2022.


2013

In 2013, four bursts were identified that supported the likelihood of extragalactic sources.


2014

In 2014, FRB 140514 was caught 'live' and was found to be 21% (±7%) circularly polarised.


2015


FRB 150418

On 18 April 2015, FRB 150418 was detected by the Parkes observatory and within hours, several telescopes including the Australia Telescope Compact Array caught an apparent radio "afterglow" of the flash, which took six days to fade. The
Subaru telescope is the telescope of the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, located at the Mauna Kea Observatory on Hawaii. It is named after the open star cluster known in English as the Pleiades. It had the largest monolithic primary mirror in t ...
was used to find what was thought to be the host galaxy and determine its
redshift In physics, a redshift is an increase in the wavelength, and corresponding decrease in the frequency and photon energy, of electromagnetic radiation (such as light). The opposite change, a decrease in wavelength and simultaneous increase in fr ...
and the implied distance to the burst. However, the association of the burst with the afterglow was soon disputed, and by April 2016 it was established that the "afterglow" originated from an active galactic nucleus (AGN) that is powered by a
supermassive black hole A supermassive black hole (SMBH or sometimes SBH) is the largest type of black hole, with its mass being on the order of hundreds of thousands, or millions to billions of times the mass of the Sun (). Black holes are a class of astronomical ob ...
with dual jets blasting outward from the black hole. It was also noted that what was thought to be an afterglow did not fade away as would be expected, supporting the interpretation that it originated in the variable AGN and was not associated with the fast radio burst.


2017

The upgraded Molonglo Observatory Synthesis Telescope (UTMOST), near
Canberra Canberra ( ) is the capital city of Australia. Founded following the federation of the colonies of Australia as the seat of government for the new nation, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The ci ...
(Australia), reported finding three more FRBs. A 180-day three-part survey in 2015 and 2016 found three FRBs at 843 MHz. Each FRB located with a narrow elliptical 'beam'; the relatively narrow band 828–858 MHz gives a less precise dispersion measure (DM). A short survey using part of
Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder The Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) is a radio telescope array located at Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory (MRO) in the Mid West region of Western Australia. The facility began as a technology demonstrator for the ...
(ASKAP) found one FRB in 3.4 days. FRB170107 was bright with a fluence of 58±6 Jy ms. According to Anastasia Fialkov and Abraham Loeb, FRB's could be occurring as often as once per second. Earlier research could not identify the occurrence of FRB's to this degree.


2018

Three FRBs were reported in March 2018 by Parkes Observatory in Australia. One (FRB 180309) had the highest
signal-to-noise ratio Signal-to-noise ratio (SNR or S/N) is a measure used in science and engineering that compares the level of a desired signal to the level of background noise. SNR is defined as the ratio of signal power to the noise power, often expressed in de ...
yet seen of 411.FRB catalog
/ref> The unusual CHIME ( Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment) radio telescope, operational from September 2018, can be used to detect "hundreds" of fast radio bursts as a secondary objective to its cosmological observations. FRB 180725A was reported by CHIME as the first detection of a FRB under 700 MHz – as low as 580 MHz. In October 2018, astronomers reported 19 more new non-repeating FRB bursts detected by the
Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder The Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) is a radio telescope array located at Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory (MRO) in the Mid West region of Western Australia. The facility began as a technology demonstrator for the ...
(ASKAP). These included three with dispersion measure (DM) smaller than seen before : FRB 171020 (DM=114.1), FRB 171213 (DM=158.6), FRB 180212 (DM=167.5).


FRB 180814

On 9 January 2019, astronomers announced the discovery of a second repeating FRB source, named FRB 180814, by CHIME. Six bursts were detected between August and October 2018, "consistent with originating from a single position on the sky". The detection was made during CHIME's pre-commissioning phase, during which it operated intermittently, suggesting a "substantial population of repeating FRBs", and that the new telescope would make more detections. Some news media reporting of the discovery speculated that the repeating FRB could be evidence of
extraterrestrial intelligence Extraterrestrial intelligence (often abbreviated ETI) refers to hypothetical intelligent extraterrestrial life. The question of whether other inhabited worlds might exist has been debated since ancient times. The modern form of the concept emerged ...
, a possibility explored in relation to previous FRBs by some scientists, but not raised by the discoverers of FRB 180814.


FRB 180916

FRB 180916, more formally FRB 180916.J0158+65, is a repeating FRB discovered by CHIME, that later studies found to have originated from a medium-sized spiral galaxy ( SDSS J015800.28+654253.0) about 500 million light-years away – the closest FRB discovered to date. It is also the first FRB observed to have a regular periodicity. Bursts are clustered into a period of about four days, followed by a dormant period of about 12 days, for a total cycle length of days. Additional followup studies of the repeating FRB by the Swift XRT and UVOT instruments were reported on 4 February 2020; by the Sardinia Radio Telescope (SRT) and Medicina Northern Cross Radio Telescope (MNC), on 17 February 2020; and, by the Galileo telescope in Asiago, also on 17 February 2020. Further observations were made by the
Chandra X-ray Observatory The Chandra X-ray Observatory (CXO), previously known as the Advanced X-ray Astrophysics Facility (AXAF), is a Flagship-class space telescope launched aboard the during STS-93 by NASA on July 23, 1999. Chandra is sensitive to X-ray sources ...
on 3 and 18 December 2019, with no significant x-ray emissions detected at the FRB 180916 location, or from the host galaxy SDSS J015800.28+654253.0. On 6 April 2020, followup studies by the Global MASTER-Net were reported on The Astronomer's Telegram. On 25 August 2021, further observations were reported.


FRB 181112

FRB 181112 was mysteriously unaffected after believed to have passed through the halo of an intervening galaxy.


2019


FRB 180924

FRB 180924 is the first non-repeating FRB to be traced to its source. The source is a galaxy 3.6 billion light-years away. The galaxy is nearly as large as the Milky Way and about 1000 times larger than the source galaxy of FRB 121102. While the latter is an active site of star formation and a likely place for magnetars, the source of FRB 180924 is an older and less active galaxy. Because the FRB was nonrepeating, the astronomers had to scan large areas with the 36 telescopes of ASKAP. Once a signal was found, they used the
Very Large Telescope The Very Large Telescope (VLT) is a telescope facility operated by the European Southern Observatory on Cerro Paranal in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile. It consists of four individual telescopes, each with a primary mirror 8.2 m acro ...
, the
Gemini Observatory The Gemini Observatory is an astronomical observatory consisting of two 8.1-metre (26.6 ft) telescopes, Gemini North and Gemini South, which are located at two separate sites in Hawaii and Chile, respectively. The twin Gemini telescopes prov ...
in Chile, and the W. M. Keck Observatory in Hawaii to identify its host galaxy and determine its distance. Knowledge of the distance and source galaxy properties enables a study of the composition of the intergalactic medium.


June 2019

On 28 June 2019, Russian astronomers reported the discovery of nine FRB events (FRB 121029, FRB 131030, FRB 140212, FRB 141216, FRB 151125.1, FRB 151125.2, FRB 160206, FRB 161202, FRB 180321), which include FRB 151125, the third repeating one ever detected, from the direction of the M 31 (Andromeda Galaxy) and M 33 (Triangulum Galaxy) galaxies during the analysis of archive data (July 2012 to December 2018) produced by the BSA/LPI large phased array
radio telescope A radio telescope is a specialized antenna and radio receiver used to detect radio waves from astronomical radio sources in the sky. Radio telescopes are the main observing instrument used in radio astronomy, which studies the radio frequency ...
at the Pushchino Radio Astronomy Observatory.


FRB 190520

FRB 190520 was observed by the FAST telescope and was localized using the realfast system at the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA). Optical observations using the Palomar 200-inch Hale Telescope revealed a host dwarf galaxy at redshift z=0.241. This is the second FRB observed to have an associated Persistent Radio Source (PRS). The dispersion measure(DM) and rotation measure measurements reveals a very dense, magnetized and turbulent environment local to the source. In June 2022, astronomers reported that FRB 20190520B was found to be another repeating FRB.


FRB 190523

On 2 July 2019, astronomers reported that FRB 190523, a non-repeating FRB, has been discovered and, notably, localized to a few-arcsecond region containing a single massive galaxy at a redshift of 0.66, nearly 8 billion light-years away from Earth.


August 2019

In August 2019, the CHIME Fast Radio Burst Collaboration reported the detection of eight more ''repeating'' FRB signals.


FRB 191221

On 13 July 2022, the discovery of an unusual FRB 20191221A detected by CHIME was reported. It is a multicomponent pulse (nine or more components) with peaks separated by 216.8ms and lasting an unusually long duration of three seconds. This is the first time such a periodic pulse was detected.


FRB 191223

On 29 December 2019, Australian astronomers from the Molonglo Observatory Synthesis Telescope (MOST), using the UTMOST fast radio burst equipment, reported the detection of FRB 191223 in the Octans
constellation A constellation is an area on the celestial sphere in which a group of visible stars forms a perceived pattern or outline, typically representing an animal, mythological subject, or inanimate object. The origins of the earliest constellation ...
(RA = 20:34:14.14, DEC = -75:08:54.19).


FRB 191228

On 31 December 2019, Australian astronomers, using the
Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder The Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) is a radio telescope array located at Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory (MRO) in the Mid West region of Western Australia. The facility began as a technology demonstrator for the ...
(ASKAP), reported the detection of FRB 191228 in the Piscis Austrinus
constellation A constellation is an area on the celestial sphere in which a group of visible stars forms a perceived pattern or outline, typically representing an animal, mythological subject, or inanimate object. The origins of the earliest constellation ...
(RA = 22:57(2), DEC = -29:46(40)).


2020


FRB 200120

Fast repeating burst observations are reported in May 2021. In late February 2022, astronomers reported that M81, a grand design spiral galaxy about 12 million light-years away, may be the source of FRB 20200120E, a repeating fast radio burst.


FRB 200428

On 28 April 2020, astronomers at the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment (CHIME), reported the detection of a bright radio burst from the direction of the Galactic magnetar
SGR 1935+2154 SGR 1935+2154 (or SGR J1935+2154) is a soft gamma repeater (SGR) that is an ancient stellar remnant, in the constellation Vulpecula, originally discovered in 2014 by the Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory. Currently, the SGR-phenomena and the r ...
about 30,000 light years away in the
Vulpecula Vulpecula is a faint constellation in the northern sky. Its name is Latin for "little fox", although it is commonly known simply as the fox. It was identified in the seventeenth century, and is located in the middle of the Summer Triangle (an ...
constellation A constellation is an area on the celestial sphere in which a group of visible stars forms a perceived pattern or outline, typically representing an animal, mythological subject, or inanimate object. The origins of the earliest constellation ...
. The burst had a DM of 332.8 pc/cc. The STARE2 team independently detected the burst and reported that the burst had a fluence of >1.5 MJy ms, establishing the connection between this burst and FRBs at extragalactic distances. The burst was then referred to as FRB 200428. The detection is notable, as the STARE2 team claim it is the first ever FRB detected inside the
Milky Way The Milky Way is the galaxy that includes our Solar System, with the name describing the galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars that cannot be individually distinguished by the naked eye. ...
, and the first ever to be linked to a known source. That link strongly supports the idea that fast radio bursts emanate from magnetars.


FRBs 200914 and 200919

On 24 September 2020, astronomers reported the detection of two new FRBs, FRB200914 and FRB200919, by the
Parkes Radio Telescope Parkes may refer to: * Sir Henry Parkes (1815–1896), Australian politician, one of the earliest and most prominent advocates for Australian federation Named for Henry Parkes * Parkes, New South Wales, a regional town * Parkes Observatory, a rad ...
. Upper limits on low-frequency emission from FRB 200914 were later reported by the Square Kilometre Array radio telescope project.


FRB 201124

On 31 March 2021, the CHIME/FRB Collaboration reported the detection of FRB 20201124A and related multiple bursts within the week of 23 March 2021 — designated as 20210323A, 20210326A, 20210327A, 20210327B, 20210327C, and 20210328A — and later, likely 20210401A and 20210402A. Further related observations were reported by other astronomers on 6 April 2021, 7 April 2021, and many more as well, including an "extremely bright" pulse on 15 April 2021. Source localization improvements were reported on 3 May 2021. Even more observations were reported in May 2021, including "two bright bursts". On 3 June 2021, the SETI Institute announced detecting "a bright double-peaked radio burst" from FRB 201124A on 18 May 2021. Further observations were made by the
Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, previously called the Swift Gamma-Ray Burst Explorer, is a NASA three-telescope space observatory for studying gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) and monitoring the afterglow in X-ray, and UV/Visible light at the location ...
on 28 July 2021 and 7 August 7, 2021 without detecting a source on either date. On 23 September 2021, 9 new bursts from FRB 20201124A were reported to have been observed with the Effelsberg 100-m Radio Telescope, followed by one CHIME observation, all after four months of no detections. In January and February 2022, further observations of new bursts from FRB 20201124A with the Westerbork-RT1 25-m telescope were also reported. In mid-March 2022, further observations of FRB 20201124 were reported. In September 2022, astronomers suggested that the repeating FRB 20201124A may originate from a magnetar/
Be star Be stars are a heterogeneous set of stars with B spectral types and emission lines. A narrower definition, sometimes referred to as ''classical Be stars'', is a non-supergiant B star whose spectrum has, or had at some time, one or more Balmer e ...
binary.


2021


FRB 210401

On 2 and 3 April 2021, astronomers at the
Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder The Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) is a radio telescope array located at Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory (MRO) in the Mid West region of Western Australia. The facility began as a technology demonstrator for the ...
(ASKAP) reported the detection of FRB 20210401A and 20210402A which were understood likely to be repetitions of FRB 20201124A, a repeating FRB with recent very high burst activity, that was reported earlier by the CHIME/FRB collaboration.


FRB 210630

On 30 June 2021, astronomers at the Molonglo Observatory Synthesis Telescope (UTMOST) detected FRB 210630A at the "likely" position of "RA = 17:23:07.4, DEC =+07:51:42, J2000".


FRB 211211

On 15 December 2021, astronomers at the
Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, previously called the Swift Gamma-Ray Burst Explorer, is a NASA three-telescope space observatory for studying gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) and monitoring the afterglow in X-ray, and UV/Visible light at the location ...
reported further observations of the "bright CHIME FRB 20211122A (event #202020046 T0: 2021-12-11T16:58:05.183768)".


2022


FRB 220414

On 14 April 2022, astronomers at Tianlai Cylinder Pathfinder Array (a radio interferometer located in
Xinjiang, China Xinjiang, SASM/GNC: ''Xinjang''; zh, c=, p=Xīnjiāng; formerly romanized as Sinkiang (, ), officially the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (XUAR), is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China (PRC), located in the northwest ...
, operated by the National Astronomical Observatory,
Chinese Academy of Sciences The Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS); ), known by Academia Sinica in English until the 1980s, is the national academy of the People's Republic of China for natural sciences. It has historical origins in the Academia Sinica during the Republi ...
(NAOC)) detected FRB 220414 (?) ("A bright burst was detected with a S/N~15 for ~2.2 ms duration at UT 17:26:40.368, April 14, 2022 (MJD 59684.06018945136)") located at "RA = 13h04m21s(\pm 2m12s), DEC = +48\deg18'05"(\pm 10'19")".


FRB 220912

On 15 October 2022, astronomers at CHIME/FRB reported the detection of nine bursts in three days of FRB 20220912A. Since later bursts observed between 15 October 2022 and 29 October 2022 by the CHIME/FRB collaboration, astronomers, afterwards, at the
Allen Telescope Array The Allen Telescope Array (ATA), formerly known as the One Hectare Telescope (1hT), is a radio telescope array dedicated to astronomical observations and a simultaneous search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI). The array is situated at th ...
(ATA), on 1 November 2022, reported eight more bursts from FRB 20220912A. ATA coordinates were first set to the original settings (23h09m05.49s + 48d42m25.6s) and then later to the newly updated ones (23h09m04.9s +48d42m25.4s). On 13 November 2022, further burst activity of FRB 20220912A was reported by the Tianlai Dish Pathfinder Array in
Xinjiang, China Xinjiang, SASM/GNC: ''Xinjang''; zh, c=, p=Xīnjiāng; formerly romanized as Sinkiang (, ), officially the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (XUAR), is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China (PRC), located in the northwest ...
and, on 5 December 2022, from several other observatories. On 13 December 2022, over a hundred bursts from FRB 220912A were reported by the Upgraded Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope (uGMRT), operated by the National Centre for Radio Astrophysics of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in
India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area, the List of countries and dependencies by population, second-most populous ...
. On 21 December 2022, several more bright bursts of FRB 220912A using the Westerbork-RT1 were reported.


FRB 221128

On 1 December 2022, astronomers reported the discovery of FRB 20221128A, using the UTMOST-NS radio telescope located in
New South Wales, Australia ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , es ...
. According to the astronomers, "The most likely position f FRB 20221128Ais RA = 07:30(10), DEC = -41:32(1), J2000 which corresponds to Galactic coordinates: Gl = 177.1 deg, Gb = 24.45 deg".


20221206

On 6 December 2022, detection of a possible magnetar burst at or near the same time and location as a fast radio burst was reported.


List of notable bursts

All FRBs are cataloged at TNS.


See also

* Fast blue optical transient *
Gamma-ray burst In gamma-ray astronomy, gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are immensely energetic explosions that have been observed in distant galaxies. They are the most energetic and luminous electromagnetic events since the Big Bang. Bursts can last from ten millise ...


References


External links

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