Caught another galactic 'through-the-air' laser that shot to Earth

The MeerKAT radio telescope in South Africa has captured a ghostly, laser-like cosmic object that traveled 5 billion light-weights to reach our world.

The object LADUMA J033046.20-275518.1 is what is known as a "megamaser", a form of microwave equivalent to a laser but extremely powerful, in which light is amplified by emitting stimulated radiation.

Planets, comets, clouds, stars. can all create maser, but a maser of "mega" range must be fired by something extremely powerful.

The circle with the plus sign is where the mysterious laser is emitted

According to a research team led by astronomer Marcin Glowacki of the Curitn University campus of the International Center for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR - Australia), megamasers can be created by forms of "cosmic monsters". such as supermassive black holes or violent impacts, collisions, and mergers.

"This is a collision of galaxies that is creating new stars and feeding massive black holes," said Dr. Glowacki, Science Alert.

The light of this object traveled through a distance of 5 billion light-years to reach our world. So it's been billions of years for the thing to actually hit the Earth with a laser, and it may well have ceased to exist.

The source of this fierce laser has been identified as the WISEA galaxy J033046.26−275518.3, which has been newly named Nkalakatha.

The image of the host galaxy firing a laser was captured by another telescope

This was an accidental discovery when the team was on another mission to search for a wavelength of 21 cm emitted by neutral hydrogen in the early universe, stretched by the expansion of the universe.

But the discovery opens a new window for astronomers to understand more about how galaxies merged in the universe's past.

The study has just been published online and will be published in the upcoming issue of The Astrophysical Journal Letters.