[url=http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/space/10244688/Most-powerful-magnetic-field-in-universe-that-is-20-trillion-times-stronger-than-a-fridge-magnet.html?fb]Article:[/url]
[quote]The strongest magnetic field in the universe has potentially been discovered – a dead star that packs the equivalent mass of our sun into an area just 12 miles across.
The former star, which has the catchy name SGR 0418+5729, is 6,500 light years from Earth and was initially thought to have an unusually low magnetic field.
New observations using the European Space Agency’s XMM Newton Space Telescope have, however, revealed that it may be the strongest magnetic source in the known universe.
Astronomers estimate that it produces a magnetic field around 20 trillion times stronger than a standard refrigerator door magnet.
The dead star is a kind of neutron star called a magnetar – the dead core of a once massive star that has collapsed in on itself.
These produce extremely dense objects that sporadically throw out X-rays and gamma rays as they rotate.
“Until very recently, all indications were that this magnetar had one of the weakest surface magnetic fields known,” said Dr Andrea Tiengo of the Istituto Universitario di Studi Superiori, Pavia, Italy, who led the study.
“It was roughly a 100 times lower than for typical magnetars. Understanding these results was a challenge.
“However, we suspected that SGR 0418 was in fact hiding a much stronger magnetic field, out of reach of our usual analytical techniques.”
SGR 0418 was first discovered in 2009 by Nasa’s Fermi space telescope and the Russian Koronas-Photon observatory.
At the time it appeared to have one of the weakest magnetic fields of any magnetar discovered, but analysis of observations by the XMM Newton space telescope have shown otherwise.
Magnetars spin a complete rotation within just a few seconds. By measuring the rate at which the spin of a magnetar declines allows astronomers to calculate its magnetic field.
Dr Tiengo and his colleagues, however, used a new technique that searches for variations in the X-rays given off by the magnetar as it rotates.
They calculated that SGR 0418 must have a magnetic field of more than 1 quadrillion, or 1,000 trillion, gauss, the unit used to measure the strength of a magnetic field.
By comparison, the iron core of the Earth is thought to have a magnetic field of 25 gauss.
Physicists have estimated that the upper limit for a magnetar would be 100 quadrillion gauss, but none have been found to be this powerful yet.
“To explain our observations, this magnetar must have a super-strong, twisted magnetic field reaching 10^15 Gauss across small regions on the surface, spanning only a few hundred meters across,” said Dr Tiengo.
“On average, the field can appear fairly weak, as earlier results have suggested. But we are now able to probe substructure on the surface and see that the field is very strong locally.”
The researchers, whose findings are published in the journal Nature, now hope the new technique may help them discover other hidden magnetars and may help reveal more about those that have already been identified.
Norbert Schartel, ESA’s XMM-Newton project scientist, said: “The spectral data provided by XMM-Newton, combined with a new way of analysing the data, allowed us to finally make the first detailed measurements of the magnetic field of a magnetar, confirming it as one of the largest values ever measured in the universe."
“We now have a new tool to probe the magnetic fields of other magnetars, which will help constrain models of these exotic objects.”[/quote]
-
Is this supposed to be interesting? A giant magnetic field? The higgs boson was interesting, finding the electron was interesting, discovering the mechanics of gravity was interesting. This is just mundane and doesn't even have an applicable purpose behind hit.
-
So what does this have to do with me? Why do I care about a measurement from an unreachable part of space that already abides by well established scientific law?
-
You know, Godzilla can create powerful magnetic fields to. You wanna know who Godzilla is? [spoiler]Me[/spoiler]
-
So magnetars are another possibility for a collapsing star to turn into?
-
I love new discoveries in science, especially astronomy, but I'm also getting tired of it. I starting not to care and you will to when you realize we are never going there to see it. We technically, haven't gone to outer space yet.
-
Magnetic field? No, that's just my field of awesomeness.
-
There is no such thing as a job opening in astrophysics.
-
In the whole universe huh? If an iron rod was thrown into space and it floated in the direction of the field. How close does it have to get before the field pulls the rod in?
-
That's attractive...
-
I only wish that they had added the necessary "yet" at the end of the finding. Its the most powerful in the universe, yet. They found it with a new technique. That means it has yet to be applied to other areas of the sky.
-
aleinz
-
I'll name it Samuel
-
[quote]new tool to probe[/quote] lol OT: dat's cewl brah!