The nebula is six light-years wide and is a growing cloud of debris formed by a supernova explosion. (A light year is six trillion miles).
The light from this supernova first reached Earth in July 1054 and was witnessed by astronomers in Japan and China.
When the star exploded, it formed a neutron star, which is the dense core of a star that is about the size of a city like Chicago. It has become a pulsar, or rapidly rotating neutron star, that is now in the nebula.
This star rotates 30 times per second and is considered to be one of the brightest pulses that emit light in X-rays and radio wavelengths, which is visible in our sky. When these rays of light pass through the Earth, scientists can catalog those impulses and determine if it is a pulsar.
It emits millisecond-long light pulses from radio waves, called giant radio pulses, which are accompanied by X-ray overvoltages.
How the nebula was discovered
A global team of scientists made the discovery using data from NASA’s NICER telescope, or the neutron star Interior Composition Explorer, which is on the International Space Station.
The NICER telescope was used to observe the Crab Nebula pulsar between August 2017 and August 2019. It was also observed using ground-based telescopes, such as the 34-meter spacecraft at the Kashima Space Technology Center in Japan and the spacecraft. 64 meters from the Usuda Deep Space Center of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. Kashima’s telescope was irreparably damaged by a typhoon in 2019.
“Out of more than 2,800 pulsars cataloged, the Crab pulsar is one of the few to emit giant radio pulses, which occur sporadically and can be hundreds to thousands of times brighter than normal pulses,” said Teruaki Enoto, author and team of the leading study to the RIKEN Pioneering Research Group in Wako, Saitama Prefecture, Japan, in a statement.
“After decades of observations, it has been shown that only the Crab improves its giant radio pulses with emissions from other parts of the spectrum.”
The team was able to analyze the largest amount of X-ray and radio data ever collected simultaneously from a pulsar, expanding the range of known energy by thousands.
The team collectively captured 3.7 million pulsar rotations and 26,000 giant pulsar radio pulses.
Giant radio pulses occur in millions of seconds and can be unpredictable – until they occur. Then release regular pulses.
NICER accuracy allowed X-rays to be recorded within 100 nanoseconds of detection.
The telescope can keep up
“NICER’s ability to observe bright X-ray sources is almost four times the combined brightness of both its pulsar and nebula,” said Zaven Arzoumanian, NICER’s deputy chief researcher and chief scientific officer at the Space Flight Center. NASA’s Goddard of Greenbelt, Maryland. , in a statement.
“These observations were largely unaffected by accumulations – if a detector counts two or more X-rays as a single event – and other issues that complicated previous analyzes.”
An analysis of X-rays that took place in tandem with the giant radio pulses revealed increases in X-rays of about 4%, which is very similar to the 3% increase in visible light that also became associated with the pulses.
Although it may sound like a small percentage difference, X-rays are millions of times more energetic than radio waves.
“We still don’t understand how or where pulsars produce their complex and large-scale emission, and it’s gratifying to have contributed another piece to the wavelength puzzle of these fascinating objects,” Enoto said.
Unlocking a space mystery
Understanding more about these giant radio pulses could provide information about the mysterious fast radio explosions that travel millions and billions of light years to reach Earth.
Some scientists believe that the mechanics behind the origin of giant radio pulses from pulsars may also be the same as the origin of fast radio explosions. These explosions, known as FRBs, are also millisecond long radio signals and some of them were even traced back to their source and knew how to repeat themselves. But their origins are unknown.
It is believed that these rapid radio explosions, which occur outside our galaxy, have also been associated with pulsars.
“However, the relationship between the two is still controversial, and these findings, along with future findings on fast radio explosions, will help us understand the relationship between these phenomena,” Enoto said.