Fast Radio Bursts Reveal Universe’s Missing Matter Hidden in Cosmic Intergalactic Fog

Fast radio bursts reveal missing baryonic matter hidden in intergalactic space.

Facebook Gadgets360 Twitter Share Tweet Snapchat LinkedIn Reddit Comment google-newsGoogle News
Fast Radio Bursts Reveal Universe’s Missing Matter Hidden in Cosmic Intergalactic Fog

Photo Credit: Pexels

Radio bursts help map the universe’s hidden baryonic matter in cosmic fog

Highlights
  • FRBs detect baryonic matter hidden in vast intergalactic regions
  • Missing normal matter traced by the slowing of distant cosmic radio bur
  • Caltech and CfA used 69 localized FRBs to solve the baryonic matter puz
Advertisement

Astronomers have at last found the universe's missing ordinary matter, the particles that formed in the first few minutes after the Big Bang and that account for everything we see around us, from the Earth to the stars. Some fast radio bursts (FRBs), vanishingly fast, hugely energetic signals from deep space, have allowed scientists to finally detect some of the missing normal matter that had eluded them for decades. 

Fast Radio Bursts Reveal Hidden Baryonic Matter Spread Across Vast Intergalactic Cosmic Fog

According to a mission update published in Nature Astronomy, researchers from Caltech and the Harvard-Smithsonian Centre for Astrophysics looked at 69 FRBs, some of which travelled up to 9.1 billion light-years, to find baryonic matter that is spread out in the space between galaxies. Using instruments like Caltech's Deep Synoptic Array and Australia's ASKAP helped the research locate and home in on the FRBs, which are too small for regular sensors to detect.

So there is a type of missing matter that has been found: It is made of particles, of course, but we interact with those particles only secondhand, via the almost unimaginably infrequent creative collision. FRBs, the cosmic headlights, have validated this by revealing baryonic matter — 76 percent in the inter­galactic, 15 percent in galactic haloes, and 9 percent within galaxies — to be distributed much more uniformly in space compared to dark matter.

The first observational evidence of this distribution that they predicted has been obtained, indicating that the FRBs can be used as a “smart tool” to probe the large-scale structure and the evolution history of the universe. This light distortion seen from these bursts is now a new tool to explore the faraway areas in space.

Caltech's DSA-2000 radio array could detect more than 10,000 FRBs every year, which would significantly advance the field of radio astronomy. This could provide a way to better understand the formation and evolution of galaxies and to more accurately measure cosmic structures. Every new FRB is a new chance to fill in the map of the unknown universe.

Play Video

 

Comments

For the latest tech news and reviews, follow Gadgets 360 on X, Facebook, WhatsApp, Threads and Google News. For the latest videos on gadgets and tech, subscribe to our YouTube channel. If you want to know everything about top influencers, follow our in-house Who'sThat360 on Instagram and YouTube.

Gadgets 360 Staff
The resident bot. If you email me, a human will respond. More... more  »
Asus Unveils Refreshed Vivobook S16, S16 OLED Laptops in India Alongside Vivobook S14: Price, Features
Apollo Astronauts Found Orange Glass Beads on the Moon, Scientists Now Know Why

Advertisement

Follow Us

Advertisement

© Copyright Red Pixels Ventures Limited 2025. All rights reserved.
Trending Products »
Latest Tech News »