I just saw that well written comment and was thinking it's a crazy thing - that an astronomer at a large gathering of astronomers, surrounded by so many interesting people, discussing so many interesting things, takes a timeout to go and post an elaborate comment on reddit.
What is that crazy need we have to put in work, for no great gain, to keep utterly random people around the world updated in real time of whatever is going on?
These days, I seem to stop myself reading the news article , just head over to the right forum, and look for such comments. It's like the news industry has become more or less irrelevant, other than in surfacing a list of headlines, which then seed my "find best comment" search algorithm.
Not such a crazy thing at all! From an astronomer's perspective, it's a rare opportunity to connect to people not working in the field about his/her field of study. Trying to break down all the jargon and explain the general state of the field is a mental exercise akin to cleaning your desk - it's both satisfying and puts things in place.
We don't get a lot of opportunities to talk about this - you can't annoy your friends with work talk all the time, so going for "utterly random people" is your only chance unless you're in science communication.
For pulses or bursts of emission, we like compact objects, just from light-travel-time arguments. I would say that the leading models involve very young, highly magnetic neutron stars ("magnetars"), either embedded in their birth supernova remnants / wind nebulae, or in the environments of massive black holes (as in the center of our Galaxy).
There are good reasons for these specific models to be favored. But honestly, we don't know for sure yet. Could it be cosmic strings? Evaporating microscopic black holes? Blobs of gas being flash-annihilated by drifting into the beams of active galactic nuclei? Theorists have models that seem to be OK on paper, and we're working hard to kill their models with new observations.
(One thing I'll say - and I say this as a firm optimist about the prospect for aliens - this is NOT aliens.)
On that wiki you can sort them alphabetically, which one professional in the field has termed "the most sensible way of [ranking them]", but other than that there's no clear consensus.
It's not really surprising: until the Chime results there's only been a single FRB that has recurred, so mostly the theorists have had a small collection of strange noises with no context that they should try to explain. Given the breezy restrictions imposed by "no context", they've taken some liberties.
Was in Okanagan for cherries and wine and just noticed a bunch of satellite dishes on Google Maps. Drove to check em out - lo and behold it's an observatory, with public tours, with one starting in 10 minutes. Had no choice but to go in. Interesting place. Quite a few people walking around with coffee mugs in their hand and looking as spaced out as your average developer deciphering a fresh kernel whoops from last night. Needless to say the atmosphere was spot on :)
Noted! I love BC, lived in Alberta a while— the Okanagan has been on the list for some time. Had no idea there were observatories there. I missed out on visiting the ones in Kona while I was there, so it's nice to know there are some accessible ones closer to home (though no cheaper of a flight from Toronto...)
It's a full interferometer, although for the pulsar and FRB modes, they are tiling the field of view with many, many phased array beams. (Yes, the computation requirements are horrendous.)
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[ 3.6 ms ] story [ 47.1 ms ] threadAre there any leading theories?
What is that crazy need we have to put in work, for no great gain, to keep utterly random people around the world updated in real time of whatever is going on?
These days, I seem to stop myself reading the news article , just head over to the right forum, and look for such comments. It's like the news industry has become more or less irrelevant, other than in surfacing a list of headlines, which then seed my "find best comment" search algorithm.
We don't get a lot of opportunities to talk about this - you can't annoy your friends with work talk all the time, so going for "utterly random people" is your only chance unless you're in science communication.
Don't trust, and verify.
There are good reasons for these specific models to be favored. But honestly, we don't know for sure yet. Could it be cosmic strings? Evaporating microscopic black holes? Blobs of gas being flash-annihilated by drifting into the beams of active galactic nuclei? Theorists have models that seem to be OK on paper, and we're working hard to kill their models with new observations.
(One thing I'll say - and I say this as a firm optimist about the prospect for aliens - this is NOT aliens.)
On that wiki you can sort them alphabetically, which one professional in the field has termed "the most sensible way of [ranking them]", but other than that there's no clear consensus.
It's not really surprising: until the Chime results there's only been a single FRB that has recurred, so mostly the theorists have had a small collection of strange noises with no context that they should try to explain. Given the breezy restrictions imposed by "no context", they've taken some liberties.
The Wow signal lasted for at least 72 seconds, FRB's last milliseconds.
Was in Okanagan for cherries and wine and just noticed a bunch of satellite dishes on Google Maps. Drove to check em out - lo and behold it's an observatory, with public tours, with one starting in 10 minutes. Had no choice but to go in. Interesting place. Quite a few people walking around with coffee mugs in their hand and looking as spaced out as your average developer deciphering a fresh kernel whoops from last night. Needless to say the atmosphere was spot on :)
If you are in a vicinity, it's worth a visit.