Strange radio signals detected from core space, origin unknown

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New Delhi : Scientists in Canada have come across a mysterious signals coming from a distant galaxy. The excat nature and origin of signal is yet to be explored. The blast of radio waves has been picked up by a telescope.

A very strange repeating signal has been detected, coming continuously from 1.5 billion light years away. The signal was unusual among the 13 fast radio bursts, known as FRBs. 

"Knowing that there is another suggests that there could be more out there," said Ingrid Stairs, an astrophysicist from the University of British Columbia (UBC).

"And with more repeaters and more sources available for study, we may be able to understand these cosmic puzzles - where they're from and what causes them."

The CHIME observatory, located in British Columbia's Okanagan Valley, consists of four 100-metre-long, semi-cylindrical antennas, which scan the entire northern sky each day.

The telescope in Canada is operational since last year which has already detected 13 of the radio bursts almost immediately, including the repeater. The research has now been published in the journal Nature.

"We have discovered a second repeater and its properties are very similar to the first repeater," said Shriharsh Tendulkar of McGill University, Canada.

"This tells us more about the properties of repeaters as a population."

To inform, FRBs are short, bright flashes of radio waves, which appear to be coming from almost halfway across the Universe.

Till date, astronomers have detected about 60 single fast radio bursts and two that repeat. They believe there could be as many as a thousand FRBs in the sky every day.