Sydney astronomers identify a fast radio burst from when the Universe was three billion years old
A team led by University of Sydney researchers identified FRB 20240304B as the most distant fast radio burst recorded, more than doubling the previous distance record. Detected by South Africa’s MeerKAT telescope and traced to its host galaxy using the James Webb Space Telescope, the burst travelled for more than 10 billion years before reaching Earth, according to the University of Sydney.
Bottom line — FRB 20240304B gives astronomers a new way to study matter between galaxies across cosmic history.
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The University of Sydney says the burst came from a time when the Universe was about three billion years old.
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Webb observations revealed a small, metal-poor host galaxy undergoing intense star formation, the university reports.
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The host was invisible to the largest ground-based telescopes, making Webb observations necessary to identify it and measure its distance.
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The team says the galaxy’s properties support the possibility that at least some fast radio bursts come from young magnetars, rather than mergers of older neutron stars.
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As the radio signal travelled through space, it carried information about otherwise hard-to-observe matter between galaxies, the researchers say.
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The finding was published in Science; the MeerKAT telescope is operated by South Africa’s SARAO, according to the university.