(ORDO NEWS) — Massive amounts of neutrinos have been detected deep beneath the Antarctic ice, coming from the galaxy Messier 77, but its characteristics do not match those of other strong neutrino sources.
The galaxy Messier 77 (NGC 1068) is one of the most studied galaxies by astronomers, but it continues to amaze. Astronomers have discovered that Messier 77 produces many high-energy neutrinos.
To find out, the researchers did not go into space , but kilometers deep into the Antarctic ice. The discovery could help explain the abundance of cosmic neutrinos coming from all directions.
Neutrinos were first proposed by physicists in 1930 because they noticed that the products of some nuclear reactions had less energy and momentum than they used to.
Since this violates all sorts of laws, it was concluded that there must be some unknown particle that they couldn’t detect. In the end, it took 26 years to find a particle that met the required requirements.
Now scientists know that the universe is filled with cosmic neutrinos, which pass through us in billions every second.
However, they are so difficult to detect, and are found in small numbers. In addition, it is difficult to determine their source.
Now a new study has shown that the Messier 77 makes a lot of them. Early research has shown that exploding stars are the main source of cosmic neutrinos. However, if there was a supernova in Messier 77, then astrophysicists would know this.
Although Messier 77 has an unusually active supermassive black hole, no jets have been found, making it a so-called radioactive active galactic nucleus.
“One neutrino allows you to determine the source.
But only observing a few neutrinos will reveal the hidden core of the most energetic objects in space,” said Professor Francis Halzen of the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Neutrinos practically do not interact with ordinary matter, which complicates the search for its source, especially if it is hidden by dust clouds. Unfortunately, it’s hard to understand what a neutrino produces if we don’t directly see the source.
The weak interactions of neutrinos force their detectors to work, looking for flashes of light emitted on the rare occasions when neutrinos create muons when they collide with atomic nuclei.
The IceCube Lab uses 86 strings that detect flashes of light in the cubic kilometer of ice it studies.
By building larger and deeper detectors, more neutrinos can be captured, and those that travel faster and therefore carry more energy.
The launch of IceCube gen-2 is currently being planned, which will allow a nearby galaxy to be compared with similar but more distant neutrino producers.
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