Journal
NATURE
Volume 609, Issue 7928, Pages 685-+Publisher
NATURE PORTFOLIO
DOI: 10.1038/s41586-022-05071-8
Keywords
-
Categories
Funding
- Strategic Priority Research Program on Space Science, the Chinese Academy of Sciences [XDA15360000, XDA15052700, XDB23040400]
- National SKA Program of China [2020SKA0120100, 2020SKA0120200]
- Natural Science Foundation of China [12041304, 11873067, 11988101, 12041303, 11725313, 11725314, 11833003, 12003028, 12041306, 12103089, U2031209, U2038105, U1831207]
- National Program on Key Research and Development Project [2019YFA0405100, 2017YFA0402602, 2018YFA0404204, 2016YFA0400801]
- Key Research Program of the CAS [QYZDJ-SSW-SLH021]
- Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province [BK20211000]
- Max Planck Partner Group
- China Manned Space Project [CMS-CSST-2021-B11, CMS-CSST-2021-A11]
- PKU development grant [7101502590]
- Christopher R. Redlich Fund, the Miller Institute for Basic Research in Science
- Xplorer Prize
- Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities [14380046]
- Program for Innovative Talents, Entrepreneur in Jiangsu
- W. M. Keck Foundation
- Cultivation Project for FAST Scientific Payoff and Research Achievement of CAMS-CAS
Ask authors/readers for more resources
This study reports the continuous observations of FRB 20201124A, revealing the irregular time variation and circular polarization of its radio bursts. These features provide evidence for the immediate environment around the source and its location in a low-stellar-density interarm region at the center of the galaxy. This finding is significant for understanding the origin of cosmological FRBs.
Fast radio bursts (FRBs) are highly dispersed, millisecond-duration radio bursts(1-3). Recent observations of a Galactic FRB4-8 suggest that at least some FRBs originate from magnetars, but the origin of cosmological FRBs is still not settled. Here we report the detection of 1,863 bursts in 82 h over 54 days from the repeating source FRB 20201124A (ref. (9)). These observations show irregular short-time variation of the Faraday rotation measure (RM), which scrutinizes the density-weighted line-of-sight magnetic field strength, of individual bursts during the first 36 days, followed by a constant RM. We detected circular polarization in more than half of the burst sample, including one burst reaching a high fractional circular polarization of 75%. Oscillations in fractional linear and circular polarizations, as well as polarization angle as a function of wavelength, were detected. All of these features provide evidence for a complicated, dynamically evolving, magnetized immediate environment within about an astronomical unit (au; Earth-Sun distance) of the source. Our optical observations of its Milky-Way-sized, metal-rich host galaxy(10-12) show a barred spiral, with the FRB source residing in a low-stellar-density interarm region at an intermediate galactocentric distance. This environment is inconsistent with a young magnetar engine formed during an extreme explosion of a massive star that resulted in a long gamma-ray burst or superluminous supernova.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available