Latest news with #DeRuiter
Yahoo
12-03-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Source of Mystery Radio Signal Traced to Clash of Magnetic Titans
From across the Milky Way galaxy, something has been sending out signals. Every two hours or so, a pulse of radio waves ripples through space-time, appearing in data going back years. Now a team of astronomers led by Iris de Ruiter of the University of Sydney has identified the source of this mystery signal – and it's something we've never seen before. Around 1,645 light-years from Earth sits a binary star system, containing a white dwarf and a red dwarf on such a close orbit that each revolution smacks their magnetic fields together, producing a burst of radio waves our telescopes can detect. This source has been named ILT J110160.52+552119.62 (ILT J1101+5521). "There are several highly magnetized neutron stars, or magnetars, that are known to exhibit radio pulses with a period of a few seconds," says astrophysicist Charles Kilpatrick of Northwestern University in the US. "Some astrophysicists also have argued that sources might emit pulses at regular time intervals because they are spinning, so we only see the radio emission when [the] source is rotated toward us. Now, we know at least some long-period radio transients come from binaries. We hope this motivates radio astronomers to localize new classes of sources that might arise from neutron star or magnetar binaries." De Ruiter first discovered the signals in data collected by the LOFAR radio telescope array. Further investigation revealed the earliest detection back in 2015. In some ways, the signal looked like a fast radio burst, a type of powerful blast of radio waves thought to originate from erupting magnetars; but there were some puzzling differences. Some fast radio bursts do repeat, and some even exhibit periodic patterns. But fast radio bursts are incredibly powerful, detected from up to billions of light-years across space-time. Only one source of fast radio bursts has been confidently identified within the Milky Way galaxy. Fast radio bursts are also, as the name implies, fast: their duration is just milliseconds at most. The pulses emitted by ILT J1101+5521 came like clockwork, every 125.5 minutes, at lower energies than typically seen for a fast radio burst, and durations that varied but averaged about a minute. The mechanism behind these signals had to be different from fast radio bursts in crucial ways. Small stars that are far away tend to be faint and hard to see. De Ruiter and her colleagues used the Multiple Mirror Telescope in Arizona and the McDonald Observatory in Texas to home in on the source of the pulses to see if they could identify the object that was creating them. As you have learnt, there was not one source, but two: a cool, dim red dwarf star, and a much, much tinier white dwarf, the collapsed core of a star similar to the Sun that has lived and died, leaving a tiny dense lump of star stuff behind, shining brightly with residual heat. These two tiny objects are so close together that their orbital period is just a hair over two hours. The smoking gun was a full, two-hour observation of the red dwarf as it appeared to whip back and forth on the spot – the telltale sign that it was gravitationally entangled with another object, too small and faint to see. The only known object that would fit is a white dwarf. The two objects are so close together that, with every orbit, their magnetic fields and the plasma therein crash together, producing a burst of radio waves that then propagate through the galaxy. "It was especially cool to add new pieces to the puzzle," de Ruiter says. "We worked with experts from all kinds of astronomical disciplines. With different techniques and observations, we got a little closer to the solution step by step." It's the first time that radio pulses have been traced to a binary object. Although they are not fast radio bursts, the discovery suggests that some sources of mystery radio waves in the Universe – including periodic fast radio bursts – may be the product of a binary interaction. The potential energies emitted by magnetars paired with massive stars, for example, would be much, much higher than the pulses of ILT J1101+5521, which could help explain at least some of the repeating fast radio burst sources scattered across the Universe. The team plans next to study ILT J1101+5521 in more detail to identify and analyze the properties of the red dwarf star and, by extension, the white dwarf with which it shares its strange orbital dance. The research has been published in Nature Astronomy. 128 New Moons Found Orbiting Saturn in Mindblowing Discovery Space Force's Secret Plane Returns After More Than a Year in Orbit Study Traces Our Solar System's Journey Through a Massive Galactic Wave
Boston Globe
05-02-2025
- Politics
- Boston Globe
Glitchy connections and busy signals: Amid firehose of Trump news, Mass. Congressional delegation's phones are jammed.
De Ruiter was one of hundreds of concerned constituents who, upset by President Trump's seemingly endless parade of executive orders and Elon Musk's and his De Ruiter said she was so incensed by the threats Musk poses to national security that she picked up the phone instead of sending an email — a first for the German national and US citizen who moved to the US for her job seven years ago. Advertisement 'We're seeing the dismantling of our democratic institutions before our eyes, in rapid time,' she said. ' I want the people who represent us to make sure they stop this.' Gloucester resident Weber Torres felt similarly when he picked up the phone to call Markey and Warren's offices on Monday about 'all the craziness that's going on in Washington, DC.' But when the call finally went through, the phone trees directing people how to leave a message were 'unintelligible' 'It sounded like an electronic voice that is sporadically cutting out,' Torres said, adding that he also tried calling from his wife's phone. He tried to leave voicemails for both offices, but wasn't sure whether they went through. Advertisement Torres, who had never called his senators before, ended up leaving a written message for both offices through a form on each senator's website. Torres was, however, able to reach his representative in the House, Seth Moulton, successfully. Several members of the Massachusetts delegation confirmed to the Globe that their offices have been inundated with calls in recent days. A spokesperson for Representative Ayanna Pressley of Boston said her office has fielded calls from constituents who are 'rightfully terrified by the unprecedented Musk-Trump assault on our democracy and what it means for their families.' Her staff has been taking live calls, logging voicemails, and calling people back, the spokesperson, Ricardo Sánchez, said. A spokesperson for Representative Richard Neal's office, said all three of his offices — in DC, Springfield, and Pittsfield — have seen 'a significant uptick in calls,' particularly about Musk's access to personal tax information. Neal represents the western part of the state, including the cities of Springfield, Chicopee, Pittsfield, Westfield, and Holyoke. Jack Chamberland, the spokesperson, said at least 75 percent of daily calls from constituents the past few days have been people voicing concerns about the new administration. A spokesperson for Representative Jake Auchincloss, who represents the southern part of the state to the Rhode Island border, said one of his district offices experienced 'brief technical difficulties on Monday' and that his DC and district offices in Newton and Attleboro are receiving an 'increased volume of callers.' A spokesperson for Representative Jim McGovern, whose district encompasses much of Franklin, Hampshire, and Worcester counties, said while there haven't been technical issues with the phone lines, the office's call volume has been 'exceptionally high with outrage over Donald Trump's actions.' Advertisement Sydney Simon, a spokesperson for Moulton, said his two offices in DC and Salem collectively answered 700 calls on Tuesday alone, most of which were about Trump and Musk. It's not just Massachusetts. In Maine, the office of Representative Chellie Pingree, a Democrat, Pingree's colleague, Representative Jared Golden, also a Democrat whose district covers the state's vast Second Congressional District, expressed a similar sentiment about Musk. 'My constituents and a majority of this country put Trump in the White House, not this unelected, weirdo billionaire,' he told the Press Herald. Samantha J. Gross can be reached at
