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CNN Indonesia

Tuesday, 28 Nov 2023 17:21 IWST

Jakarta, CNN Indonesia —

For astronomer detected rare and very high-energy particles falling to Earth. This phenomenon sparked confusion because the particles came from the region outer space which appears to be empty.

The particle, named Amaterasu after the sun goddess in Japanese mythology, is one of the highest-energy cosmic rays ever detected.

Only the most powerful cosmic events, on a scale far beyond stellar explosions, are thought to be capable of producing such energetic particles.

However, quoted from The GuardianAmaterasu appears to emerge from the Local Void, an area of ​​empty space bordering the Milky Way galaxy.

“You trace its trajectory all the way back to its source and there’s no energy high enough to produce it,” said John Matthews, of the University of Utah, who is also a co-author of the paper in the journal Science which revealed these findings.

“That’s the mystery, what really happened?” he continued.

Amaterasu particles have an energy exceeding 240 exa-electron volts (EeV), millions of times more than particles produced at the Large Hadron Collider, the most powerful accelerator ever built, in Europe, or equivalent to the energy of a golf ball traveling at 95 mph ( 152.88 km per hour).

It is second only to the Oh-My-God particle, another ultra-high energy cosmic ray reaching 320 EeV that was detected in 1991.

“Objects that are considered energetic, like supernovae, are not energetic enough for this,” says Matthews, “You need huge amounts of energy, very high magnetic fields, to confine the particle as it accelerates.”

Toshihiro Fujii, a professor at Osaka Metropolitan University in Japan, admitted that he had suspected there was an error in the energy detection.

“When I first discovered these very high-energy cosmic rays, I thought there must be an error, because they showed energy levels unprecedented in the last three decades,” he said.

Experts reveal that the suspected source of this large energy is a supermassive black hole at the heart of another galaxy.

In these enormous cosmic entities, matter is released back into its subatomic structure, and protons, electrons, and atomic nuclei are flung throughout the universe at nearly the speed of light.

Cosmic rays, echoes of powerful celestial events, also rain down on Earth almost continuously and can be detected by man-made instruments such as the Telescope Array observatory in Utah, USA, which also discovered the Amaterasu particle.

Below a certain energy threshold, the flight path of these particles resembles balls in a pinball machine that zigzag against electromagnetic fields through the micro-cosmic wave background.

However, particles with Oh-My-God or Amaterasu level energies are expected to blast through intergalactic space relatively unaffected by galactic and extra-galactic magnetic fields, meaning their origins can be traced.

Empty space

Tracing its trajectory backwards leads to an empty space. Likewise, Oh-My-God particles have no obvious source.

Scientists think this may indicate a much larger than expected magnetic deflection or aberration, an unknown source in the Local Void, or an incomplete understanding of the physics of high-energy particles.

“These events seem to come from very different places in the sky. There doesn’t seem to be one mysterious source,” said John Belz of the University of Utah, one of the paper’s authors.

“It could be a flaw in the fabric of space-time, a collision of cosmic strings. I mean, I’m just throwing out crazy ideas that people come up with because there’s no conventional explanation.”

The Array Telescope is uniquely positioned to detect very high-energy cosmic rays.

It is located at about 1,200 m (4,000 ft), a height point that allows secondary particles to develop maximally, but before they begin to collapse.

Its location in Utah’s Western Desert provides ideal atmospheric conditions in two respects: dry air is essential because moisture will absorb the ultraviolet light necessary for detection.

Additionally, dark skies in this region are essential, as light pollution would create too much noise and obscure cosmic rays.

The Telescope Array is undergoing an expansion that astronomers hope will help solve the case. Once completed, 500 new scintillator detectors will expand the Telescope Array to an area of ​​2,900 km2.

(team/arh)