A gigantic beam of matter and antimatter emanates from a collapsed star just 16 kilometers wide: the phenomenon could help understand the influence of positrons, the equivalent of electrons in antimatter, on our galaxy.
A group of astronomers from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory has recorded a beam of matter and antimatter over 64 trillion kilometers long: The huge beam is powered by a pulsar, a tiny collapsing star that spins rapidly and is endowed with a strong magnetic field.
According to a press release, the finding could explain the presence and impact of the positrons, which are the antimatter counterparts of electrons and are found throughout the Milky Way. The new study, recently published in The Astrophysical Journal, enriches observations made in 2020: at that time, scientists had not been able to appreciate the full length of the beam generated by the pulsar, because it extended beyond the edge of the Chandra detector. With the new observations, they found that the beam or filament is the longest produced by a pulsar seen from Earth, at least so far.
sources of antimatter
The antimatter is the extension of the antiparticle concept to matter. In this way, antimatter is a less frequent variety of matter, which is made up of antiparticles, which are opposed to the particles that make up ordinary matter. In other words, antimatter is similar to ordinary matter but with their electrical charges reversed. For example, a positron is the positively charged equivalent of an electron.
Although the vast majority of the Universe consists of ordinary matter rather than antimatter, specialists continue to find evidence of a relatively large number of positrons in detectors located on Earth. Consequently, they try to discover what are the possible sources of this antimatter identified in the Milky Way and how it reaches our planet.
The press that has generated the huge beam could provide some clues in this regard: called PSR J2030 + 4415, it is located about 1,600 light years from Earth. This city-sized object rotates around three times a second, and was formed from the collapse of a massive star. It is traveling through interstellar space at approximately 1.6 million kilometers per hour.
Video: The identified beam could solve some of the deepest mysteries related to antimatter in the Milky Way. Credit: Chandra X-ray Observatory / YouTube.
A “leak” of antiparticles
Scientists believe that these pulsars may be a kind of “factories & rdquor; of antimatter, some of which escapes from the environment of these collapsing stars and the halos they produce, spreading out across the galaxy and reaching Earth. Why would this phenomenon be generated? Apparently, the combination of two extremes such as the rapid rotation and high magnetic fields of pulsars creates the conditions for particle acceleration and high-energy radiation, thus gestating pairs of electrons and positrons.
Everything indicates that the Pulsar PSR J2030 + 4415 and the like may be filtering these positrons out into the galaxy. In the specific case studied, the interaction between the interstellar magnetic field and the magnetic field of the pulsar itself would have produced a particle leakage: High-energy electrons and positrons spurted out through a “nozzle” formed by the connection between both magnetic fields.
As the particles moved along that interstellar magnetic field line at about one-third the speed of light, they flashed and produced the extensive bundle or filament observed in X-rays by Chandra. In further investigations, the researchers will try to delve into the role that pulsars play in the distribution of antiparticles throughout the Milky Way.
Reference
Application of a Steady-state Accretion Disk Model to Spectrophotometry and High-resolution Spectra of Two Recent FU Ori Outbursts. Antonio C. Rodríguez et al. The Astrophysical Journal (2022). DOI:https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ac496b