Mysterious Radio Waves Emitted From Nearby Galaxy

[jayfish]

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18775-mysterious-radio-waves-emitted-from-nearby-galaxy.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news

There is something strange in the cosmic neighbourhood. An unknown object in the nearby galaxy M82 has started sending out radio waves, and the emission does not look like anything seen anywhere in the universe before.

"We don't know what it is," says co-discoverer Tom Muxlow of Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics near Macclesfield, UK.

The thing appeared in May last year, while Muxlow and his colleagues were monitoring an unrelated stellar explosion in M82 using the MERLIN network of radio telescopes in the UK. A bright spot of radio emission emerged over only a few days, quite rapidly in astronomical terms. Since then it has done very little except baffle astrophysicists.

It certainly does not fit the pattern of radio emissions from supernovae: they usually get brighter over a few weeks and then fade away over months, with the spectrum of the radiation changing all the while. The new source has hardly changed in brightness over the course of a year, and its spectrum is steady

Nice coincidence. I was just looking at M82 (and M81) last-night in my new scope.

FSH

[rbixby]

1. I for one

Welcome our new M82 overlords

[MineralMan]

2. It's the Millennium Falcon, making for Dagobah.

Luke is sitting on the radio mic.

[krispos42]

3. Great, we're being butt-dialed by a Jedi wannabe.

:eyes:

[supernova]

9. I swiped your sig cartoon

for my SO, he's a sysadmin and will get a kick out of it. :-)

[krispos42]

10. You can find the full-size one on the XKCD website

This one is shrunk a little to meet the sigline rules. :-)

[Bitwit1234]

4. Maybe they are sick and tired of Palin overload also

and are telling the MSM to shut the hell up.

[old mark]

5. It will be the alien version of "I Love Lucy"....They just invented TV!!!!

The end of their civilization, too.


mark

[Occulus]

6. How far have our first signals traveled, anyway?

Television and radio.

[old mark]

7. Early radio, maybe 100 light years more or less-speed of light. TV, I guess

possibly 75 years if you consider experimental TV starting ca. 1935.
"Lucy" broadcasts, maybe 50 light years.

We got some 'splainin' to do.....


mark

[Heywood J]

8. In theory, they'll travel on infinitely at the speed of light once broadcast from Earth.

Practically, they fade into the jumble of background noise after a light year or so. Most of the radiated TV and radio signal is directed towards locations on the surface of the Earth, so there isn't much power leaking into space (this is a loss from the broadcaster's point of view).

Directed sources, like an intentional transmission on a direct line towards another solar system, will travel much farther before fading into noise. We've sent a few of those out (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_interstellar_radio_messages">list here).

[and-justice-for-all]

11. "The stuff in these jets is moving towards us at a slight angle "

Very interesting to say the least.

"and traveling at a fair fraction of the speed of light"

Is there a picture of where this thing is in M82?

[Thor_MN]

12. Analysis shows it to be ads for recordings of adolescent cloud creatures on spring break,

taking showers.

[dipsydoodle]

13. Whatever............

you want. Did it have Quo's rhythm ? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krK7Q49o6uA

[rug]

14. This happens every summer.

Damn assholes and their damn radios.

[jberryhill]

16. It's a Galactic "Boom Car"

We should all roll up our windows and scowl.

Maybe they'll turn it down.

[atomic-fly]

15. cool

what scope did you get? Did M82 show up very well?

[jayfish]

18. I Got A 12" Newtonian.

For my heavily light-polluted sky's it was very nice(as well as M81). My main dark-site opens May 1st and the views should be spectacular.

FSH

[deutsey]

17. Here's a photo of the "unknown object"

Swing down sweet chariot, stop and let me ride...

[jayfish]

19. That's Funky Looking.

I would never have imagined.

Jay