The ancient discovery made on the Miami River is so significant it could derail development


Andres Viglucci
Sat, April 1, 2023

The site of a major prehistoric archaeological discovery in Miami’s Brickell district is extensive and significant enough to merit protection from development under local laws, according to a new analysis jointly drawn up by independent experts and the city’s historic preservation office.

The analysis, to be presented to the city’s historic preservation board in a public hearing on Tuesday, could significantly up the ante in a growing effort by archaeologists, preservationists, Brickell residents and Native American activists to spare at least some of the ancient indigenous site, on the south bank of the Miami River, from planned high-rise development by prominent real estate developer Related Group.

A presentation slide deck prepared for the hearing concludes the site meets several of the legal criteria for designation as a protected historic and archaeological landmark, not least because of its antiquity.

The site was part of an extensive town believed to have been built some 2,500 years ago by the Tequesta tribe, which disappeared with the end of the first Spanish occupation of Florida in 1763.

Experts contend the Brickell discoveries may constitute the most significant in a series of archaeological finds made at the mouth of the Miami River in the past 25 years that include the Miami Circle National Historic Landmark, thought to be around 2,000 years old.

The independent archaeologists, including experts from the University of Miami, say a cluster of stone spear points that are among the thousands of artifacts and animal and human remains found at the site show indigenous occupation on the riverbank probably dates back as far as 7,000 years ago. (Fragmentary human remains have been removed for reburial elsewhere under supervision of the Seminole Tribe of Florida.)

Ongoing excavation of roughly half the site has so far uncovered some 350 postholes carved into the limestone bedrock that likely mark the foundation of prehistoric structures, according to the presentation.

The presentation notes that the posthole patterns include one circle, and possibly a second, reminiscent of the Miami Circle, the ancient Tequesta foundation of a ceremonial structure that’s been preserved as a state park across Brickell Avenue.

A bronze statue of a Tequesta hunter, woman and child stands on the Brickell Bridge in downtown Miami as a tribute to the indigenous tribe that occupied the mouth of the Miami River 2,000 years ago. A new archaeological excavation by the bridge has unearthed evidence that indigenous occupation of the site dates back 7,000 years ago. MATIAS J. OCNER/mocner@miamiherald.comMore

The presentation notes that the Miami Circle site and the development property were once contiguous, but were split by the construction of buildings and Brickell Avenue over decades.

The site and the trove of artifacts recovered from it represent thousands of years of previously undocumented history of indigenous settlement in Miami before modern times, and does so in an unusually rich and well-preserved fashion, the presentation concludes.

“Without seeing it for yourself, it will be difficult to imagine the enormous yield of information as material culture that has been found here,” the presentation says.
City could stop construction

If the city historic preservation board embraces the presentation’s conclusions, it could vote to launch a formal designation review that would freeze permitting and construction on most of the property until it can make a final determination on the merits, a process that can take weeks if not months.

That move could pitch a monkey wrench into longstanding plans by Related Group to build three residential skyscrapers on the site, which sits just west of the Brickell Avenue Bridge. Related, which paid $104 million for the property in 2013, has taken out a $164 million construction loan for the first phase, an apartment tower, and has begun ground preparation work for its foundations after archaeologists finished digging on that portion of the property. Related is already advertising the second planned tower, the Baccarat Residences luxury condos.

If the preservation board ultimately approves designation, it could require Related to preserve all or a portion of the site, to provide exhibition space and public access for artifacts in any project it builds, or take other measures to protect or highlight its archaeological and historical importance.

Related, founded by developer Jorge Perez and now run day-to-day by his son John Paul Perez, is expected to object to designation. The company has been largely silent on the findings and the massive excavation that’s been in progress for about a year and a half, and has consistently declined requests from Miami Herald reporters for comment or interviews. On Friday, a spokesman emailed a statement from John Paul Perez, the Related president, after declining the latest request for an interview or to respond to questions from the Herald.

In the statement, Perez said he will ask the city preservation board to delay consideration of designation until after the excavation project is completed, calling any action now “premature” and “redundant.” He did not provide a timeline.

He said the company is working on a “preservation action plan,” but provided no details. That plan would not be presented to the public until excavation is finished, a Related spokesman said.

“Related Group’s vision for the 444 Brickell site is to create a timeless and inspirational project — an investment that we knew would take time, commitment, money, and creativity,” according to the statement from Perez. “We remain committed to delivering a property worthy of its unique location on the Miami River at the gateway to Brickell Avenue. A project that enriches the area providing public access to the waterfront and duly honoring the site’s history.

“We invested tens of millions of dollars over the last two years to ensure the archaeological integrity of the project. We contracted (and paid for) world-renowned archaeologists to painstakingly excavate and preserve all the significant findings with the utmost respect and care. And these expenses have yet to include the cost of implementing the activities laid out by our forthcoming preservation action plan.

“And we are not finished. The archaeological team continues to work on the site to ensure all findings are properly excavated, documented, and cataloged. Taking any step toward additional designations and restrictions at the upcoming HEP Board meeting is premature. The site is already protected by the strict regulations of being located within a designated archeological area, and an overlapping designation that imposes the same procedural rules is redundant.”

Members of an archeological team sift through soil excavated from the site of a planned Related Group residential tower complex in Brickell. The team has unearthed extensive evidence of occupation by prehistoric indigenous people and artifacts dating back 7,000 years. MATIAS J. OCNER/mocner@miamiherald.com

Developer questioned antiquity

In an op-ed article published in the Miami Herald on March 16, Jorge Perez cast doubt on claims of the site’s antiquity, complained of “misleading information” by critics and argued none of it is worth preserving beyond the recovered artifacts. Perez promised in the article published on the Herald’s opinion pages, without details, that Related would store and preserve the finds and make materials available for public exhibition.

But supporters of preservation say a promise from Related is not enough. They note that developers of the Met Square project on the river’s north bank failed to fully live up to promises made in a mediation accord to preserve and exhibit another portion of the Tequesta town.

The Related site is too important to leave it up to the developers to decide what to do about it, said Abby Apé, managing director of the Brickell Homeowners Association, which supports designation. She expects several members to testify at Tuesday’s hearing in favor of requiring Related to preserve all or part of the site.

“We need the city’s leadership on this,” Apé said. “They’ve been giving the developer free reign. The city has a code. They should enforce it. Shouldn’t we have a plan in place? A lot of the neighbors are saying, do not build over it.”

Robert Rosa, a representative of the American Indian Movement and the United Confederation of Taino People who has been rallying support for preservation among Native American groups, said many tribal elders think indigenous burial sites should not be disturbed.

“We want everything returned,” Rosa said. “We want some equitable agreement. We prefer it all be preserved. We understand there is $164 million on the line. We understand that is not small chump change, but it is chump change to a billionaire. We want the desecration to stop.”

Teams of archaeologists have been quietly and painstakingly digging for at least 16 months on one of two parcels where Related plans to build. Excavation so far has taken place on the site of the demolished former U.S. Customs headquarters. A second building that houses the Capital Grille restaurant, at 444 Brickell, is still standing but would eventually be demolished and that site excavated as well.

Because the parcels sit in a city-designated archaeological zone where indigenous occupation was known to have occurred, Related was required by city ordinances to undertake and pay for archaeological exploration and excavation of the properties, being carried out under the direction of veteran South Florida archaeologist Robert Carr.

In his reports, Carr has noted the site is important enough to potentially merit inclusion in the National Register of Historic Places. He also suggests that intact sections of midden — ancient refuse heaps where many of the artifacts, bones and shells are found — could be “preserved as part of the development.”

An archaeological team works at the site of a planned Related Group residential tower complex on the Miami River in Brickell. A 16-month excavation has unearthed a remarkable trove of prehistoric indigenous finds, including artifacts dating back to the dawn of human civilization 7,000 years ago. MATIAS J. OCNER/mocner@miamiherald.com

Independent archaeologists and Miami preservation officials stress Related does appear to have met all legal requirements, including the submission to the city of reports detailing the discoveries, and preservation of artifacts and organic remnants like animal bones and shells.
Critics say city slow to act

But critics say the city did little to publicize the findings or move to consider preservation until a group of archaeologists began turning up at preservation board hearings early this year to ask that something be done. In early February, on the same day the Herald published an in-depth story describing the findings, the board voted 8-0 to order the city preservation office to begin collaborating with archaeologists from UM and the Florida Public Archaeology Network, based at the University of West Florida in Pensacola, on a fuller analysis.

The resulting presentation contains more than enough evidence to justify full consideration for designation, said one of the archaeologists, William Pestle, chairman of UM’s anthropology department.

“I would hope that the board sees fit to follow the process laid out in the city code, and not preemptively derail this before the site is given due consideration,” Pestle said.

Under that legal process, the preservation board would instruct preservation officer Anna Pernas to prepare an in-depth report and recommend whether to designate the site as historic. If designation does occur, any plans for construction or permits at the site that have not yet been approved by the city will be subject to approval by the preservation board. The preservation board would have authority to require Related to set aside open space or incorporate exhibitions and public access in its project.

Related could appeal designation to the Miami city commission, which has in the past shown itself willing to overturn historic preservation board decisions. Further appeals would go to Miami-Dade circuit court.

Archaeologists excavating the site of a planned Related Group residential tower complex on the Miami River in Brickell have uncovered extensive evidence of prehistoric indigenous settlements dating back to the dawn of human civilization 7,000 years ago. The discoveries indicate that the capital of the Tequesta tribe, believed responsible for the 2,000-year-old Miami Circle, visible at top, was significantly more extensive than once believed. MATIAS J. OCNER/mocner@miamiherald.com

Site occupied for thousands of years

The new evidence, Pestle and other independent archaeologists say, suggests that the Related site was occupied by a succession of indigenous people starting in what’s known as the Archaic period, some 5,000 years before the date of the Miami Circle. Although that degree of antiquity would have to be confirmed by further analysis, Pestle and others note there is precedent for artifacts dating back that far in South Miami-Dade at the Deering Estate and elsewhere in Florida as well.

The finds also demonstrate that the Tequesta village on the river, the tribe’s principal settlement, was bigger than previously believed, they say. Spanish accounts put the settlement only on the river’s north bank. But the finds at the Related site, just steps from the Miami Circle, indicate that at its peak hundreds of years ago the Tequesta town spread along both banks of the river.

Among the most abundant finds at the Related site are postholes cut into the bedrock to support buildings and boardwalks, as well as animal bones and shells, seeds and wood, pottery shards, and stone tools used to make wooden structures and canoes. The new animal finds are likely evidence of ancient feasts and ceremonies at the site, Pestle said,

The materials, including thousands of pounds of shells and animal bones, have been carted away to storage in over 2000 bankers boxes, Pestle said, and he expects hundreds more will be filled by the time excavation is completed.

Some critics say they think the developers and the city have attempted to downplay the discoveries to avoid the kind of public uproar and litigation that led to the preservation of the Miami Circle from condo development in 1999, as well as another Tequesta circle and other antiquities across the river at the Met Square development in 2014.

The Dogs of Chernobyl Are Experiencing Rapid Evolution, Study Suggests

1.3k
Darren Orf
Sat, April 1, 2023 

Are Chernobyl Dogs Experiencing Rapid Evolution?Sean Gallup - Getty Images

For decades, scientists have studied animals living in or near the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant to see how increased levels of radiation affect their health, growth, and evolution.

A new study analyzed the DNA of 302 feral dogs living near the power plant, compared the animals to others living 10 miles away, and found remarkable differences.

While the study doesn’t prove that radiation is the cause of these differences, the data provides an important first step in analyzing these irradiated populations, and understanding how they compare to dogs living elsewhere.

On April 26, 1986, the Chernobyl Nuclear Reactor in northern Ukraine—then part of the Soviet Union—exploded, sending a massive plume of radiation into the sky. Nearly four decades later, the Chernobyl Power Plant and many parts of the surrounding area remain uninhabited—by humans, at least.

Animals of all kinds have thrived in humanity’s absence. Living among radiation-resistant fauna are thousands of feral dogs, many of whom are descendants of pets left behind in the speedy evacuation of the area so many years ago. As the world’s greatest nuclear disaster approaches its 40th anniversary, biologists are now taking a closer look at the animals located inside the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone (CEZ), which is about the size of Yosemite National Park, and investigating how decades of radiation exposure may have altered animals’ genomes—and even, possibly, sped up evolution.

Scientists from the University of South Carolina and the National Human Genome Research Institute have begun examining the DNA of 302 feral dogs found in or around the CEZ to better understand how radiation may have altered their genomes. Their results were published in the journal Science Advances earlier this month.

“Do they have mutations that they’ve acquired that allow them to live and breed successfully in this region?” co-author Elaine Ostrander, a dog genomics expert at the National Human Genome Research Institute, told The New York Times. “What challenges do they face and how have they coped genetically?”

The idea of radiation speeding up natural evolution isn’t a new one. The practice of purposefully irradiating seeds in outer space to induce advantageous mutations, for example, is now a well-worn method for developing crops well-suited for a warming world.

Scientists have been analyzing certain animals living within the CEZ for years, including bacteria, rodents, and even birds. One study back in 2016 found that Eastern tree frogs (Hyla orientalis), which are usually a green color, were more commonly black within the CEZ. The biologists theorize that the frogs experienced a beneficial mutation in melanin—pigments responsible for skin color—that helped ionize the surrounding radiation.

This made scientists ponder: could something similar be happening to Chernobyl’s wild dogs?

This new study uncovered that the feral dogs living near the Chernobyl Power Plant showed distinct genetic differences from dogs living only some 10 miles away in nearby Chernobyl City. While this may seem to heavily imply that these dogs have undergone some type of rapid mutation or evolution due to radiation exposure, this study is only a first step in proving that hypothesis. One environmental scientist, speaking with Science News, says that these studies can be tricky business, largely due to the fact that sussing out radiation-induced mutations from other effects, like inbreeding, is incredibly difficult.

However, this study provides a template for further investigation into the effects of radiation on larger mammals, as the DNA of dogs roaming the Chernobyl Power Plant and nearby Chernobyl City can be compared to dogs living in non-irradiated areas. Despite a current lack of firm conclusions, the study has shown once again that an area that—by all rights—should be a wasteland has become an unparalleled scientific opportunity to understand radiation and its impact on natural evolution.

A wild iguana in Costa Rica bit a little girl as it tried to steal her piece of cake. Now, doctors say she has developed a rare bacterial infection.

Sarah Al-Arshani
Sat, April 1, 2023 

An iguana is seen as the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission continues its efforts to try and control the invasive species on March 13, 2018 in Miami, Florida.

Getty Images/Joe Raedle

In a rare attack, an iguana bit a child for her cake in Costa Rica.

Five months later, a strange cyst began to grow on the site the girl was bitten.

Scientists found that the girl was infected with a rare bacteria, possibly the first from an iguana bite.

A girl's rare infection could have been linked to an encounter with an iguana that had a craving for cake, scientists suspect.

CNN reported that a scientific presentation on the unidentified 3-year-old girl's case will be given at the European Congress of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases this month.

Last March, the unnamed girl was on vacation with her parents in Costa Rica. Her parents gave her a cake as she hung out by the water. A wild iguana ran up to her, bit her finger and stole her cake.

"It was trying to mark its territory or something like that," Dr Jordan Kit Mah, a medical microbiologist at Stanford University told the Guardian.

Iguanas are typically harmless and herbivores, but this one appears to have developed a liking for sweets, CNN reported.

Her parents noticed that the bite was superficial but still took her to a local clinic, which disinfected the wound and gave her antibiotics. The wound healed, but five months later, they noticed a bump in the same spot.

While the girl said the bump did not hurt, it had grown to the size of a coin, and was a reddish-bluish color, the Guardian reported. The family took the child to the doctor.

At first, the parents hadn't thought the iguana bite had anything to do with it. Doctors suspected it might be a cyst but as it continued to grow, the parents realized the bump was in the same spot as the iguana bite, CNN reported.

The bump continued to grow and began causing mild pain, which sent the girl to an orthopedist. She has a biopsy which revealed a rare infection.

The little girl had developed Mycobacterium marinum, which typically causes tuberculosis-like illness in fish but rarely infects humans. Humans usually get this infection if they have open wounds and come into contact with contaminated water. Mah told CNN that he believes this is the first time a human has gotten this infection from an iguana bite.

"There is we know a lot about animal bites and bacteria, infections, following, let's say, dogs or cats, but there really isn't much for lizards, let alone iguana," he said. "I don't think people should be afraid, but doctors should be aware of the possibility."

He told the Guardian that he's not surprised it took this long for the girl to develop symptoms since the bacteria is very slow to grow and has a long incubation period.

The infection doesn't respond well to typical antibiotics but the little girl was put on rifampin, an antimicrobial, and clarithromycin, an antibiotic and according to Mah, is improving.

"Typically, with these infections, because they take a very long time to grow and they're a little bit more fastidious, you need to treat them for a longer period of time, sometimes several months," Mah told CNN. "So she's doing better. I wouldn't say 100%, but she's doing a lot better than she was initially."

A fungus known for killing trees has infected a human for the first time, causing a pus-filled abscess to grow in his throat


Andrea Michelson
Fri, March 31, 2023 

Silver leaf tree fungus, or Chondrostereum purpureum,HHelene/Getty Images

A man in India visited a doctor for a sore throat that affected his ability to eat and swallow.

Doctors found an abscess in his throat, and it was full of a fungus usually only found on trees.

These infections may grow more common in humans as fungi adapt to warmer temperatures.

It seems like a scene out of "The Last of Us" — a fungus never before seen in humans has just been discovered growing in a person for the first time.

A plant researcher in India saw a doctor for a sore throat and learned he had a fungal infection growing in his throat, causing an abscess that had to be drained of pus.

Fortunately for him, this fungus was nothing like the Cordecyps seen in the hit HBO TV show. It's known to gardeners as silver leaf, a progressive disease that turns a tree's leaves silver before killing the infected branch.

The patient, a 61-year-old man, told doctors that he had a long history of working with decaying plant materials for research, according to a report published in the journal Medical Mycology Case Reports. He sought medical attention after three months of hoarseness, trouble swallowing, loss of appetite, cough, and fatigue.

Silver leaf is a common blight on stone fruit trees and some flowering shrubs, but this is the first time it has infected a human, according to the report. When the doctors analyzed the man's pus, they found it grew a "creamy pasty" fungal colony in a petri dish.

Their tests for fungi known to infect humans came back negative, so the doctors sent a sample to a local World Health Organization laboratory. DNA sequencing revealed that the fungus was Chondrostereum purpureum, the culprit behind silver leaf.

Climate change may help fungi adapt to infect humans

After doctors drained the man's abscess, they sent him on his way with a broad-spectrum antifungal drug. He took two pills a day for 60 days and made a complete recovery, according to the report.

While it's relatively rare for a healthy person to be infected with a fungus that usually preys on plants, it has happened before with other types of fungus. According to the case study authors, these infections may become more common as the world's temperatures rise.

"The worsening of global warming and other civilization activities opens Pandora's Box for newer fungal diseases," they wrote.

Michelle Momany, a professor of plant biology who studies fungi at the University of Georgia, told Insider that a fungus would have to evolve to live in warmer temperatures for it to really spread between humans. "The infection was in the throat, not deep in the lungs where the body temperature is higher," she said. Momany was not affiliated with the case report.

Even if it's unlikely that silver leaf will become a major threat to humans anytime soon, people who work with fungal spores should take caution with a high-quality mask to avoid inhaling a potential pathogen, she said.

Contamination Prevention Is Key as NASA Preps for Incoming Asteroid Samples

Passant Rabie

March 28, 2023 

An artist's depiction of the asteroid samples being dropped off to Earth. (Illustration: NASA)

In October 2020, engineers landed a spacecraft on an asteroid 200 million miles (320 million km) from Earth and collected a rocky sample from its surface. But that wasn’t even the hardest part. Now the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft is on its way back to Earth to drop off that sample, with NASA rehearsing the smoothest way to catch it without ruining the whole mission.

The spacecraft has spent seven years in space and is now gearing up for its final, yet most challenging, task. OSIRIS-REx is on schedule to drop off a sample from asteroid Bennu on September 24 during a flyby of Earth, when it will eject a capsule containing the asteroid sample. The capsule will parachute its way down to Earth and land at the Air Force’s Utah Test and Training Range in the Great Salt Lake Desert.

“Once the sample capsule touches down, our team will be racing against the clock to recover it and get it to the safety of a temporary clean room,” Mike Moreau, deputy project manager at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Centre, said in a statement. The sense of urgency here stems from fear that the sample will get spoiled by Earthly contaminants, thereby foiling the entire mission.

The capsule has to land within a 60 km by 14 km ellipse about 13 minutes after it is released by the spacecraft. Teams from NASA Goddard, KinetX, Lockheed Martin, and NASA’s Langley Research Centre will be monitoring weather, solar activity, and space debris to make sure the capsule lands safely.

This summer, recovery teams in Utah and Colorado will be practicing all the steps required to recover the sample, rehearsing how to unpack and process the sample inside glove boxes before transporting it to the lab in Houston via helicopter, according to NASA. The recovery crews will also collect soil and air samples around the capsule’s landing area to help identify if any contaminants came in contact with the asteroid sample.

A different team of scientists is preparing the investigations that will be conducted on the sample once it’s delivered to the lab. Once the sample is received, scientists will unpack it and allocate up to a quarter of it to the mission’s science team in different parts of the world while the rest will be distributed among other scientists who are not part of the mission.

Members of the mission team practicing with a mock glove box. (Photo: NASA Johnson/Bill Stafford)

“There are two things pervasive on Earth: water and biology,” Jason Dworkin, OSIRIS-REx project scientist at NASA Goddard, said in the statement. “Both can severely alter meteorites when they land on the ground and muddle the story told by the sample’s chemistry and mineralogy. A pristine sample could provide insights into the development of solar system.”

This is NASA’s first attempt at retrieving a sample from an asteroid. The Japanese space agency (JAXA)’s Hayabusa2 grabbed a small sample of dust, pebbles, and gas from the Ryugu asteroid in 2019 and delivered the asteroid sample to Earth in 2020. A recent study of the asteroid sample revealed the presence of two organic molecules, supporting the hypothesis that the building blocks of life itself travelled to Earth by hitchhiking on asteroids that crashed on our planet billions of years ago.

Analysing the Bennu sample will provide scientists with more evidence as to how life may have originated on Earth. “We will do a direct comparison of the samples from Ryugu and the sample from asteroid Bennu when NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission returns it to Earth,” Dworkin said in a February press release.

As OSIRIS-REx prepares for its big drop-off, recovery teams on Earth are perfecting their plan to catch the asteroid sample and make sure it stays pristine.

Twitter and bookmark Gizmodo’s dedicated Spaceflight page.

Microplastic found in Antarctic krill and salps

by British Antarctic Survey

Antarctic krill, small crustaceans, are filter feeders eating phytoplankton and other 

microscopic organisms. Credit: Pete Lens (BAS)

A new study led by researchers at the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) discovered microplastics in krill (Euphausia superba), a small shrimp-like crustacean, and salps (Salpa thompsoni), a gelatinous marine invertebrate. The results are published today (March 29) in the journal Royal Society Open Science.

While Antarctic krill have been observed ingesting microplastics in laboratory settings, the team's findings provide important evidence that these animals, as well as other zooplankton, ingest plastic in their natural environment.

Microplastics are present in the Southern Ocean from the sea surface to seabed. Due to the small size of these particles (<5 mm), Antarctic zooplankton are likely to mistake the plastics for their natural food source. The team focused on two of the most abundant species of Southern Ocean zooplankton: Antarctic krill, and salps. These two species are critical to the diet of much of the Southern Ocean's marine wildlife. Krill is the main food source for whales, penguins, and seals while salps are eaten by some fish and larger marine birds.

Krill and salp samples were collected onboard the research ship RRS James Clark Ross on two research missions off the Northern tip of the Antarctic Peninsula in 2016 and near the island of South Georgia in 2018. Microplastics were extracted from both species with plastic microfibers most common. One of the largest sources of these fibers is shedding from clothing during washing and drying. Around 60% of the krill and salps contained nylon, a microplastic with significant commercial applications in clothing, fishing gear, ropes, and reinforcing car tires.

Credit: British Antarctic Survey

Lead author Laura Wilkie Johnston, a marine biologist at BAS says, "Evidence of microplastic consumption in two very high abundance species of the Southern Ocean is concerning. Both of these species are an integral part of the Southern Ocean ecosystem, and we don't yet fully understand the impact microplastics will have in this environment."

Co-author Dr. Emily Rowlands, a marine biologist at BAS, says, "We have already seen the harmful effects that plastic ingestion can have on Antarctic zooplankton in the lab. In this study we show how these animals are vulnerable to plastic in their natural habitat. The research is particularly important as it supports laboratory experiments and provides new insights into the amounts and types of plastics krill and salps are exposed to in the Southern Ocean."

The findings underline how sensitive the Antarctic marine ecosystem is to plastic pollution. Due to the short food chains in the Antarctic, transfer of these microplastics from the krill to larger predators such as whales, penguins, and seals is highly likely. Plastic in krill and salps could also negatively impact the Southern Ocean as one of the planets largest carbon sinks.

Co-author Dr. Clara Manno, a pelagic marine ecologist at BAS, and lead scientist on the CUPIDO project, says, "In addition to being important food sources in the Antarctic marine ecosystem, krill and salps play an important role in slowing down climate change. The Southern Ocean is a hugely important carbon sink and these animals play an integral part transferring atmospheric CO2 into the deep oceans. Interactions with microplastics have the potential to interfere with the amount of carbon these organisms can take down and trap in the deep ocean."

More information: Laura Wilkie Johnston et al, Organic or junk food? Microplastic contamination in Antarctic krill and salps, Royal Society Open Science (2023). DOI: 10.1098/rsos.221421

Journal information: Royal Society Open Science 

Provided by British Antarctic Survey Microplastics affect global nutrient cycle and oxygen levels in the ocean

For the first time, astronomers have linked a mysterious fast radio burst with gravitational waves

by Clancy William James, The Conversation

Credit: ASKAP, CSIRO

We have just published evidence in Nature Astronomy for what might be producing mysterious bursts of radio waves coming from distant galaxies, known as fast radio bursts or FRBs.

Two colliding neutron stars—each the super-dense core of an exploded star—produced a burst of gravitational waves when they merged into a "supramassive" neutron star. We found that two and a half hours later they produced an FRB when the neutron star collapsed into a black hole.

Or so we think. The key piece of evidence that would confirm or refute our theory—an optical or gamma-ray flash coming from the direction of the fast radio burst—vanished almost four years ago. In a few months, we might get another chance to find out if we are correct.

Brief and powerful

FRBs are incredibly powerful pulses of radio waves from space lasting about a thousandth of a second. Using data from a radio telescope in Australia, the Australian Square Kilometer Array Pathfinder (ASKAP), astronomers have found that most FRBs come from galaxies so distant, light takes billions of years to reach us. But what produces these radio wave bursts has been puzzling astronomers since an initial detection in 2007.

The best clue comes from an object in our galaxy known as SGR 1935+2154. It's a magnetar, which is a neutron star with magnetic fields about a trillion times stronger than a fridge magnet. On April 28 2020, it produced a violent burst of radio waves—similar to an FRB, although less powerful.

Astronomers have long predicted that two neutron stars—a binary—merging to produce a black hole should also produce a burst of radio waves. The two neutron stars will be highly magnetic, and black holes cannot have magnetic fields. The idea is the sudden vanishing of magnetic fields when the neutron stars merge and collapse to a black hole produces a fast radio burst. Changing magnetic fields produce electric fields—it's how most power stations produce electricity. And the huge change in magnetic fields at the time of collapse could produce the intense electromagnetic fields of an FRB.

The search for the smoking gun

To test this idea, Alexandra Moroianu, a masters student at the University of Western Australia, looked for merging neutron stars detected by the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) in the US. The gravitational waves LIGO searches for are ripples in spacetime, produced by the collisions of two massive objects, such as neutron stars.

Artist’s impression of a fast radio burst traveling through space and reaching Earth.

 Credit: ESO/M. Kornmesser, CC BY

LIGO has found two binary neutron star mergers. Crucially, the second, known as GW190425, occurred when a new FRB-hunting telescope called CHIME was also operational. However, being new, it took CHIME two years to release its first batch of data. When it did so, Moroianu quickly identified a fast radio burst called FRB 20190425A which occurred only two and a half hours after GW190425.

Exciting as this was, there was a problem—only one of LIGO's two detectors was working at the time, making it very uncertain where exactly GW190425 had come from. In fact, there was a 5% chance this could just be a coincidence.

Worse, the Fermi satellite, which could have detected gamma rays from the merger—the "smoking gun" confirming the origin of GW190425—was blocked by Earth at the time.

Unlikely to be a coincidence

However, the critical clue was that FRBs trace the total amount of gas they have passed through. We know this because high-frequency radio waves travel faster through the gas than low-frequency waves, so the time difference between them tells us the amount of gas.

Because we know the average gas density of the universe, we can relate this gas content to distance, which is known as the Macquart relation. And the distance traveled by FRB 20190425A was a near-perfect match for the distance to GW190425. Bingo!

So have we discovered the source of all FRBs? No. There are not enough merging neutron stars in the Universe to explain the number of FRBs—some must still come from magnetars, like SGR 1935+2154 did.

And even with all the evidence, there's still a one in 200 chance this could all be a giant coincidence. However, LIGO and two other gravitational wave detectors, Virgo and KAGRA, will turn back on in May this year, and be more sensitive than ever, while CHIME and other radio telescopes are ready to immediately detect any FRBs from neutron star mergers.

In a few months, we may find out if we've made a key breakthrough—or if it was just a flash in the pan.

More information: Alexandra Moroianu et al, An assessment of the association between a fast radio burst and binary neutron star merger, Nature Astronomy (2023). DOI: 10.1038/s41550-023-01917-x

Journal information: Nature Astronomy 

Provided by The Conversation 

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Deciphering the lives of double neutron stars in radio and gravitational wave astronomy

Uncanny Coincidence: Fast Radio Burst Detected After Gravitational Wave Event

SPACE28 March 2023

ByMICHELLE STARR

Artist's impression of a neutron star collision. (ESO/L. Calçada/M. Kornmesser)

Every so often, a strange signal from outer space hits our detectors here on Earth.

Known as fast radio bursts (FRBs), these signals are extremely short, just milliseconds in duration, and are detected only in radio wavelengths.

Yet in those milliseconds, and in those wavelengths, they can discharge as much energy as 500 million Suns – and most of them have never been detected again.

What they are, and how they are generated, is something of a baffling mystery. But a new discovery could point to a previously unknown mechanism producing these powerful bursts of radiation.

On the 25th of April in 2019, the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment (CHIME) recorded a bright, non-repeating fast radio burst ( FRB).

Just 2.5 hours earlier, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) recorded a gravitational wave event, the collision as a binary neutron star reached the inevitable conclusion of its decaying orbit.

The FRB's location in the sky fell within the credible region of the gravitational wave event, and from a similar distance. The chance that the two events were unrelated, a team of astronomers led by Alexandra Moroianu of the University of Western Australia has determined, is extremely small.

FRBs are extremely enigmatic; only a few of them repeat, and the one-off nature of the vast majority makes them extraordinarily difficult to study.

Their detection used to be chance only; you had to be studying the right patch of the sky at the right time to catch one. All-sky surveys, however, have increased the number of detections to over 600.

A breakthrough came in 2020: for the first time, an FRB was detected coming from within the Milky Way galaxy. It was traced to a type of neutron star called a magnetar, whose insanely powerful external magnetic field fights against the inward pull of gravity, causing the star to occasionally quake and flare.

But while misbehaving magnetars present one explanation, we don't know if that's the whole picture. FRBs vary quite a bit, and it's likely that there's more than one mechanism that can produce them.

There are several theories that predict an association between FRBs and gravitational waves, particularly if neutron stars are involved, either during or following the gravitational wave detection.

So Moroianu and her colleagues went looking in catalogs. The CHIME catalog of observations from July 2018 to July 2019 overlapped with the LIGO-Virgo observation run, for a total of 171 FRB events.

The researchers cross-referenced these events with the GWTC-2 catalog, looking for FRB events that occurred temporally close to gravitational wave detections, within the patch of the sky identified by LIGO.

And they got a very palpable hit.

The cyan spot represents FRB20190425A. The red-orange regions represent the part of the sky from which GW20190425 could have emerged. (Moroianu et al., Nature Astronomy, 2023)

GW20190425 was observed by LIGO on 25 April 2019 at 08:18:05 UTC. The absence of a detection by the Virgo detector helped constrain the region from which the detection had emerged. Its estimated distance was around 520 million light-years away, generated by a merger between two neutron stars.

FRB20190425A was detected the same day, at 10:46:33 UTC, within the range of sky LIGO had laid out as a plausible source of the neutron star merger, and with an upper distance limit of 590 million light-years.

This, they found, would be an uncanny coincidence if the two were unrelated. The probability of the two events occurring at the distances given, the timeframe of detection, and within the region of space defined by LIGO was just 0.00019, the researchers calculated.

The two events likely emerged from a galaxy called UGC 10667, but the mechanism that produced the FRB might take a little more analysis.

For now, the team believes that the burst was caused by a blitzar, a mechanism proposed for FRBs nearly a decade ago. This is when a neutron star too massive to remain supported by degeneracy pressure collapses into a black hole when its spin slows – the only thing that was preventing this collapse.

"Although we cannot definitively assign the potential GW-FRB association to a single theory, it is consistent with the GW, short gamma-ray burst (sGRB) and FRB association theory that invokes the collapse of a post-binary neutron star-merger magnetar," the researchers write.

"The FRB generation mechanism is the so-called blitzar mechanism, which has been confirmed through numerical simulations. Within this scenario, the 2.5-hour delay time between the FRB and the GW event is the survival time of the supramassive neutron star before collapsing into a black hole, which is consistent with the expected range of the delay timescale for a supramassive magnetar from both theory and observational data."

The masses of the neutron stars of GW20190425 were significantly higher than most neutron star binaries detected in the Milky Way. These lower mass binaries would produce more stable heavyweight neutron stars after they merge, which could survive a long time and repeatedly spit out FRBs, thus explaining the few repeating FRB sources.

Whether or not the two events were linked remains to be confirmed, but one thing is certain: the estimated rate of binary neutron star mergers is far, far lower than the rate at which FRBs like FRB190425A are detected. So this potential mechanism cannot, alone, account for the mysterious signals that sputter across the radio sky.

Further investigation is still warranted. But it's tremendously exciting that we seem to be closing in on some answers.

The research has been published in Nature Astronomy.

Watch a gamma-ray burst in this stunning animation

 

Watch an animation of a black hole shooting jets of particles through a "collapsing star at nearly the speed of light" and emit "x-rays and gamma rays (magenta)," according to NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.-- Brightest gamma-ray burst ever seen a 1-in-10,000-years event that's 'absolutely monstrous,' scientists say: https://www.space.com/brightest-gamma...

Brightest gamma-ray burst ever seen a 1-in-10,000-years event that's 'absolutely monstrous,' scientists say

By Mike Wall published 4 days ago

'There's a reasonable chance this is the brightest gamma-ray burst to hit Earth since human civilization began.'

The Hubble Space Telescope’s Wide Field Camera 3 revealed the infrared afterglow (circled) of the BOAT GRB and its host galaxy, seen nearly edge-on as a sliver of light extending to the burst's upper right. This composite incorporates images taken on Nov. 8 and Dec. 4, 2022, one and two months after the eruption. 

 (Image credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, A. Levan (Radboud University); Image Processing: Gladys Kober)

An extragalactic outburst whose light hurtled through the inner solar system last fall was 70 times brighter than any other such eruption that scientists have observed, researchers report.

Radiation from the explosion — a gamma-ray burst (GRB) known as GRB 221009A — swept over Earth on Oct. 9, 2022. It saturated gamma-ray detectors on multiple space telescopes, earning the nickname the BOAT, short for "brightest of all time."

Astronomers continued studying the BOAT with a variety of instruments for several months afterward, seeking to characterize the explosion further. And those efforts have only added to the BOAT's legend.

"It is just an absolutely monstrous burst. It is extremely extraordinary; we've never seen anything remotely close to it," Eric Burns, an assistant professor of physics and astronomy at Louisiana State University, said Tuesday (March 28) during a press conference at the 20th meeting of the American Astronomical Society's High Energy Astrophysics Division in Hawaii.

"The BOAT is a once-in-10,000-year event," Burns added. "So, there's a reasonable chance this is the brightest gamma-ray burst to hit Earth since human civilization began."

Related: What is a gamma-ray burst?

The brightest explosion of all time

It is just an absolutely monstrous burst."Eric Burns, astronomer at LSU

GRBs are the most powerful explosions in the universe. They generate more energy in mere seconds than Earth's sun will produce over its entire 10-billion-year lifetime.

Astronomers recognize two different classes: short GRBs, which last about two seconds or less, and long ones, which can continue for multiple minutes. The short variety is likely spawned by collisions of superdense stellar corpses known as neutron stars, astronomers say. Most long GRBs, on the other hand, are generated by black holes born as massive stars collapse and die.

"So, you have the core collapse; this creates a black hole. The black hole powers jets that propagate out at just under the speed of light," Burns said.

"As these jets go out, they release their energy in the form of prompt gamma-ray burst emission," he added. "This is followed by what's known as afterglow, and at later times, the energy deposited into that star powers a supernova explosion."

The BOAT was a long GRB, so researchers expect a supernova to emerge at its locale, a spot about 1.9 billion light-years from Earth. But they haven't found one yet, despite searching the area with NASA's James Webb Space Telescope and Hubble Space Telescope, along with other instruments.

"If it's there, it's very faint," Andrew Levan, a professor of astrophysics at Radboud University in the Netherlands, said in a NASA statement on Tuesday(opens in new tab). "We plan to keep looking, but it's possible the entire star collapsed straight into the black hole instead of exploding."

Why so bright?

GRB jets tend to be relatively narrow, so most of them don't sweep over Earth. But these astrophysical events, though extreme, are common enough to be observed in bulk. Astronomers have catalogued about 12,000 GRBs to date using data gathered by tools such as NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope and Konus, a Russian instrument that flies on NASA's Wind spacecraft, Burns said.

He led an analysis that dug deep into the GRB record, establishing the BOAT's brightness bona fides. And other work showed that this superlative brightness didn't stem from overly powerful jets.

"When you compare the energy in this jet, it's very similar to the energy of jets we've seen in other GRBs," Kate Alexander, an assistant professor of astronomy at the University of Arizona, said during Tuesday's press conference.

"So then, why was it so bright?" she added. "It turns out that all of the energy in this jet was focused into a very narrow angle. So, all of the particles moving in this jet were very, extremely narrowly beamed, and that narrow beam happened to be focused right at Earth."

She compared the effect to a garden hose, with the BOAT's jet analogous to the more-intense spray you get by using a constricting nozzle.

This illustration shows the ingredients of a long gamma-ray burst, the most common type. The core of a massive star (left) has collapsed, forming a black hole that sends a jet of particles moving through the collapsing star and out into space at nearly the speed of light. Radiation across the spectrum arises from hot ionized gas (plasma) in the vicinity of the newborn black hole, collisions among shells of fast-moving gas within the jet (internal shock waves), and from the leading edge of the jet as it sweeps up and interacts with its surroundings (external shock). 

(Image credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center)

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— Weird nearby gamma-ray burst defies expectations

Astronomers had to put some of their BOAT observations on hold a few months ago, as the source region went behind the sun from Earth's perspective. But that area is now coming back into view, and researchers are ready.

"More observations, including with Hubble and with Webb, are going to be undertaken in the next few weeks and months," Levan said during the Tuesday telecon.

He and a number of other researchers are especially keen to determine whether or not the BOAT spawned a supernova.

"Watch this space for what we hope will be a more conclusive answer!" Levan said.

Researchers reported these and other BOAT results in a special issue of The Astrophysical Journal Letters

Mike Wall is the author of "Out There(opens in new tab)" (Grand Central Publishing, 2018; illustrated by Karl Tate), a book about the search for alien life. Follow him on Twitter @michaeldwall(opens in new tab). Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom(opens in new tab) or on Facebook(opens in new tab).

Solar System Hit by Pulse of Intense Radiation – Incredible 1-in-10,000-Year Gamma-Ray Burst

By FRANCIS REDDY, NASA’S GODDARD SPACE FLIGHT CENTER MARCH 29, 2023

Gamma-ray bursts are the most luminous explosions in the cosmos. Astronomers think most occur when the core of a massive star runs out of nuclear fuel, collapses under its own weight, and forms a black hole, as illustrated in this animation. The black hole then drives jets of particles that drill all the way through the collapsing star at nearly the speed of light. These jets pierce through the star, emitting X-rays and gamma rays (magenta) as they stream into space. They then plow into material surrounding the doomed star and produce a multiwavelength afterglow that gradually fades away. The closer to head-on we view one of these jets, the brighter it appears. Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center

On Sunday, October 9, 2022, a pulse of intense radiation swept through the solar system so exceptional that astronomers quickly dubbed it the BOAT – the brightest of all time.

The source was a gamma-ray burst (GRB), the most powerful class of explosions in the universe.

The burst triggered detectors on numerous spacecraft, and observatories around the globe followed up. After combing through all of this data, astronomers can now characterize just how bright it was and better understand its scientific impact.

The Hubble Space Telescope’s Wide Field Camera 3 revealed the infrared afterglow (circled) of the BOAT GRB and its host galaxy, seen nearly edge-on as a sliver of light extending to the burst’s upper right. This composite incorporates images taken on Nov. 8 and Dec. 4, 2022, one and two months after the eruption. Given its brightness, the burst’s afterglow may remain detectable by telescopes for several years. The picture combines three near-infrared images taken each day at wavelengths from 1 to 1.5 microns. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, A. Levan (Radboud University); Image Processing: Gladys Kober

“GRB 221009A was likely the brightest burst at X-ray and gamma-ray energies to occur since human civilization began,” said Eric Burns, an assistant professor of physics and astronomy at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. He led an analysis of some 7,000 GRBs – mostly detected by NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope and the Russian Konus instrument on NASA’s Wind spacecraft – to establish how frequently events this bright may occur. Their answer: once in every 10,000 years.

The burst was so bright it effectively blinded most gamma-ray instruments in space, which means they could not directly record the real intensity of the emission. U.S. scientists were able to reconstruct this information from the Fermi data. They then compared the results with those from the Russian team working on Konus data and Chinese teams analyzing observations from the GECAM-C detector on their SATech-01 satellite and instruments on their Insight-HXMT observatory. Together, they prove the burst was 70 times brighter than any yet seen.

Gamma-ray bursts are the most luminous explosions in the cosmos. Astronomers think most occur when the core of a massive star runs out of nuclear fuel, collapses under its own weight, and forms a black hole, as illustrated in this animation. The black hole then drives jets of particles that drill all the way through the collapsing star at nearly the speed of light. These jets pierce through the star, emitting X-rays and gamma rays (magenta) as they stream into space. They then plow into material surrounding the doomed star and produce a multiwavelength afterglow that gradually fades away. The closer to head-on we view one of these jets, the brighter it appears. Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center

Burns and other scientists presented new findings about the BOAT at the High Energy Astrophysics Division meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Waikoloa, Hawaii. Observations of the burst span the spectrum, from radio waves to gamma rays, and include data from many NASA and partner missions, including the NICER X-ray telescope on the International Space Station, NASA’s NuSTAR observatory, and even Voyager 1 in interstellar space. Papers describing the results presented appear in a focus issue of The Astrophysical Journal Letters.

The signal from GRB 221009A had been traveling for about 1.9 billion years before it reached Earth, making it among the closest-known “long” GRBs, whose initial, or prompt, emission lasts more than two seconds. Astronomers think these bursts represent the birth cries of black holes formed when the cores of massive stars collapse under their own weight. As it quickly ingests the surrounding matter, the black hole blasts out jets in opposite directions containing particles accelerated to near the speed of light. These jets pierce through the star, emitting X-rays and gamma rays as they stream into space.

This chart compares the BOAT’s prompt emission to that of five previous record-holding long gamma-ray bursts. The BOAT was so bright it effectively blinded most gamma-ray instruments in space, but U.S. scientists were able to reconstruct its true brightness from Fermi data. Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and Adam Goldstein (USRA)

With this type of GRB, astronomers expect to find a brightening supernova a few weeks later, but so far it has proven elusive. One reason is that the GRB appeared in a part of the sky that’s just a few degrees above the plane of our own galaxy, where thick dust clouds can greatly dim incoming light.

“We cannot say conclusively that there is a supernova, which is surprising given the burst’s brightness,” said Andrew Levan, a professor of astrophysics at Radboud University in Nijmegen, Netherlands. Since dust clouds become more transparent at infrared wavelengths, Levan led near- and mid-infrared observations using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope – its first use for this kind of study – as well as the Hubble Space Telescope to spot the supernova. “If it’s there, it’s very faint. We plan to keep looking,” he added, “but it’s possible the entire star collapsed straight into the black hole instead of exploding.” Additional Webb and Hubble observations are planned over the next few months.

As the jets continue to expand into material surrounding the doomed star, they produce a multiwavelength afterglow that gradually fades away.

This illustration shows the ingredients of a long gamma-ray burst, the most common type. The core of a massive star (left) has collapsed, forming a black hole that sends a jet of particles moving through the collapsing star and out into space at nearly the speed of light. Radiation across the spectrum arises from hot ionized gas (plasma) in the vicinity of the newborn black hole, collisions among shells of fast-moving gas within the jet (internal shock waves), and from the leading edge of the jet as it sweeps up and interacts with its surroundings (external shock). Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center

“Being so close and so bright, this burst offered us an unprecedented opportunity to gather observations of the afterglow across the electromagnetic spectrum and to test how well our models reflect what’s really happening in GRB jets,” said Kate Alexander, an assistant professor in the department of astronomy at the University of Arizona in Tucson. “Twenty-five years of afterglow models that have worked very well cannot completely explain this jet,” she said. “In particular, we found a new radio component we don’t fully understand. This may indicate additional structure within the jet or suggest the need to revise our models of how GRB jets interact with their surroundings.”

The jets themselves were not unusually powerful, but they were exceptionally narrow – much like the jet setting of a garden hose – and one was pointed directly at us, Alexander explained. The closer to head-on we view a jet, the brighter it appears. Although the afterglow was unexpectedly dim at radio energies, it’s likely that GRB 221009A will remain detectable for years, providing a novel opportunity to track the full life cycle of a powerful jet.

XMM-Newton images recorded 20 dust rings, 19 of which are shown here in arbitrary colors. This composite merges observations made two and five days after GRB 221009A erupted. Dark stripes indicate gaps between the detectors. A detailed analysis shows that the widest ring visible here, comparable to the apparent size of a full moon, came from dust clouds located about 1,300 light-years away. The innermost ring arose from dust at a distance of 61,000 light-years – on the other side of our galaxy. GRB221009A is only the seventh gamma-ray burst to display X-ray rings, and it triples the number previously seen around one. Credit: ESA/XMM-Newton/M. Rigoselli (INAF

The burst also enabled astronomers to probe distant dust clouds in our own galaxy. As the prompt X-rays traveled toward us, some of them reflected off of dust layers, creating extended “light echoes” of the initial blast in the form of X-ray rings expanding from the burst’s location. The X-ray Telescope on NASA’s Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory discovered the presence of a series of echoes. Detailed follow-up by ESA’s (the European Space Agency’s) XMM-Newton telescope, together with Swift data, revealed these extraordinary rings were produced by 21 distinct dust clouds.

“How dust clouds scatter X-rays depends on their distances, the sizes of the dust grains, and the X-ray energies,” explained Sergio Campana, research director at Brera Observatory and the National Institute for Astrophysics in Merate, Italy. “We were able to use the rings to reconstruct part of the burst’s prompt X-ray emission and to determine where in our galaxy the dust clouds are located.”

GRB 221009A is only the seventh gamma-ray burst to display X-ray rings, and it triples the number previously seen around one. The echoes came from dust located between 700 and 61,000 light-years away. The most distant echoes – clear on the other side of our Milky Way galaxy – were also 4,600 light-years above the galaxy’s central plane, where the solar system resides.

Lastly, the burst offers an opportunity to explore a big cosmic question. “We think of black holes as all-consuming things, but do they also return power back to the universe?” asked Michela Negro, an astrophysicist at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt.

Her team was able to probe the dust rings with NASA’s Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer to glimpse how the prompt emission was organized, which can give insights into how the jets form. In addition, a small degree of polarization observed in the afterglow phase confirms that we viewed the jet almost directly head-on.

Together with similar measurements now being studied by a team using data from ESA’s INTEGRAL observatory, scientists say it may be possible to prove that the BOAT’s jets were powered by tapping into the energy of a magnetic field amplified by the black hole’s spin. Predictions based on such models have already successfully explained other aspects of this burst.

References:

“Focus on the Ultra-luminous Gamma-Ray Burst GRB 221009A” March 2023, The Astrophysical Journal Letters.