[The Epoch Times, November 26, 2023](Comprehensive report by Epoch Times reporter Xia Yu) A mysterious high-energy particle fell from space to the surface of the earth. Human beings don’t know where it came from, or even what it is. This may sound like science fiction, but it’s actually happening.
Space scientists have long sought to understand the mysterious origins of powerful cosmic rays. Recently, scientists have discovered an extremely rare ultra-high-energy particle. They believe that this particle comes from outside the Milky Way and is a local void or void in the universe.
The new research was published Thursday in the journal Science. The study found that the energy of this invisible subatomic particle is comparable to the most energetic cosmic ray ever observed, the “Oh-My-God” particle detected in 1991.
Cosmic rays are electrically charged particles that travel through space and continue to fall on Earth. Low-energy cosmic rays can be emitted from the sun, but extremely high-energy cosmic rays are an exception. They are thought to come from other galaxies, beyond the Milky Way.
The recently discovered particle, known as the Amaterasu Particle, named after the Japanese mythical sun goddess, was discovered by the Telescope Array of Cosmic Ray Detectors in Utah’s western desert.
The CNN website reported on November 23 that John Matthews, a co-author of the study and a research professor at the University of Utah, said: “If you stretch out your hand, a beam of (cosmic rays) will pass through your palm every second, but these Really low-energy stuff.”
“When you’re exposed to these really high-energy (cosmic rays), it’s more like one per square kilometer per century. It never passes through your hands,” he said. That is, less than one such particle reaches Earth per square kilometer per century.
After years of research, scientists still don’t know the exact origin of these high-energy particles. While scientists believe it is associated with the most dynamic phenomena in the universe, such as those involving black holes, gamma-ray bursts and active galactic nuclei, they found that the particle appears to originate in the void, or empty space, where no violent objects exist sports.
The Cosmic Ray Detector Telescope Array began operations in 2008 and consists of 507 surface detectors the size of a ping pong table covering an area of 700 square kilometers (270 square miles). According to reports, it has observed more than thirty kinds of ultra-high-energy cosmic rays, but none are larger than Amaterasu particles, which hit the atmosphere above Utah on May 27, 2021, pouring secondary particles into ground and captured by the detector. The particle was discovered by astronomer Toshihiro Fujii of Osaka City University in Japan.
“You can look at … how many particles hit each detector, and that tells you what the energy of the primary cosmic ray is,” Matthews said.
This cosmic ray event triggered 23 surface detectors and calculated an energy of approximately 244 EeV. The energy of “Oh-My-God” detected more than thirty years ago is EeV (billion electron volts).
For reference, 1 EeV equals 1 billion electron volts, so the energy of the Amaterasu particle is 244,000,000,000,000,000,000 electron volts. By comparison, the typical energy of electrons in auroras is 40,000 electron volts, according to NASA.
CNN reported that Glennys Farrar, a professor of physics at New York University, explained that ultra-high-energy cosmic rays carry tens of millions of times more energy than any man-made particle accelerator, such as the Large Hadron Collider.
“What we need is a region with a very high magnetic field – like a very large Large Hadron Collider, but naturally formed. The conditions required are very specific, so the sources are very, very rare, and the particles dissipate into In the vastness of the universe, the chance of a particle hitting the Earth is very small,” Farrar said. He was not involved in the study.
mysterious source
The origin of these ultra-high-energy particles has long puzzled scientists.
Matthews said the two most powerful cosmic rays recorded appeared to be “a bit random” – when their trajectories were traced, there didn’t appear to be anything high enough energy to produce such particles. Specifically, Amaterasu particles appear to originate in the Local Void, a region of empty space bordering the Milky Way.
He said the sources of the two highest-energy events, the just-discovered “Amaterasu” and “Oh-My-God” particles, didn’t seem to point to anything. Astronomers with visible telescopes cannot see any truly massive and violent celestial motions that could produce such particles.
“It’s coming from a hollow region that looks like a local area. What’s going on?”
Editor in charge: Li Yuan#
#Mysterious #Amaterasu #particles #fall #sky #void #universe #Epoch #Times
2023-11-26 01:05:11
