From the depths of space, billions of particles arrive on Earth every second. Now, researchers have identified a source of high-energy neutrinos for the first time - and solved a puzzle of the century.
Researchers find the extra-galactic source of ghost particles
We still do not know where they come from, says Elisa Resconi from the Technical University of Munich. It is five years since researchers used a large detector at the South Pole to detect high-energy neutrinos from deep space.
To understand this, you need to watch the video. The video from the University of Munich is called Ghost Particle.
Now, for the first time, they have also found a source of ghost particles. It's in a distant galaxy. Neutrinos hardly interact with their environment and possess almost no mass.
Video
Georgia Tech YouTube channel.
They travel billions of light years through the universe and penetrate galaxies, stars, and planets almost without a trace.
The physicists around Resconi have now taken advantage of this special feature.
Particles with enormous energy!
Our goal is actually to learn more about the origin of cosmic radiation, explains Marek Kowalski, head of neutrino astronomy at the German Electron Synchrotron (Desy) in Hamburg.
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Some particles of cosmic radiation carry enormous energy, and scientists have been puzzling for over a hundred years where, in space, they have their origin.
The problem:
Cosmic radiation - mainly protons - is charged and is therefore strongly deflected on its way to Earth. You can't understand where it came from, "says Kowalski.
The situation is different with neutrinos: they travel to Earth together with cosmic radiation but do not change direction. If you know its origin, you also know the source of cosmic radiation.
Ice Cube Neutrinos Point to Long-Sought Cosmic Ray Accelerator.
An international team of scientists, including two researchers from Georgia Tech, has found the first evidence of a source of high-energy cosmic neutrinos, ghostly subatomic particles that can travel unhindered for billions of light years from the most extreme environments in the universe to Earth.
The observations, made by the IceCube Neutrino Observatory at the Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station and in coordination with telescopes around the globe and in Earth’s orbit, help resolve a more than a century-old riddle about what sends subatomic particles such as neutrinos and cosmic rays speeding through the universe.
THE ELABORATE SEARCH FOR THE EXTREMELY VOLATILE PARTICLES
Neutrinos, however, are extremely volatile particles. Since they barely interact with matter, neutrinos pass through virtually every kind of matter unhindered.
Even though the IceCube detector with a volume of one cubic kilometre in the Antarctic ice is the largest in the world, it is still too small: Since 2013, IceCube has observed only 82 high-energy neutrinos.
That is why Elisa Resconi is working on the design of a network of neutrino telescopes distributed across the Earth.
The goal:
To increase the number of detected neutrinos so that scientists can do real astronomy to further explore many hitherto poorly understood phenomena of the universe in combination with the other astronomical messengers – electromagnetic waves and gravitational waves.
The original story is on Disclose TV.
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