Mysterious signal from the center of the Perseus Cluster

[frigidmagi]

watchers

Astronomers using NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory to explore the Perseus Cluster, a swarm of galaxies approximately 250 million light years from Earth, have observed the spectral line that appears not to come from any known type of matter. The signal they received can not be explained by known physics but they say it shifts suspicion to the dark matter.

Perseus Cluster a collection of galaxies and one of the most massive known objects in the Universe, immersed in an enormous 'atmosphere' of superheated plasma. It is approximately 768 000 light years across.

"I couldn't believe my eyes," says Esra Bulbul of the Harvard Center for Astrophysics. "What we found, at first glance, could not be explained by known physics."

"The cluster's atmosphere is full of ions such as Fe XXV, Si XIV, and S XV. Each one produces a 'bump' or 'line' in the x-ray spectrum, which we can map using Chandra. These spectral lines are at well-known x-ray energies."
Yet, in 2012 when Bulbul added together 17 day's worth of Chandra data, a new line popped up where no line should be.

"A line appeared at 3.56 keV (kilo-electron volts) which does not correspond to any known atomic transition," she says. "It was a great surprise."

"It took a long time to convince myself that this line is neither a detector artifact, nor a known atomic line," Bulbul said. "I have done very careful checks. I have re-analyzed the data; split the data set into different sub groups; and checked the data from four other detectors on board two different observatories. None of these efforts made the line disappear."

In short, it appears to be real. The reality of the line was further confirmed when Bulbul's team found the same spectral signature in X-ray emissions from 73 other galaxy clusters. Those data were gathered by Europe's XMM-Newton, a completely independent X-ray telescope.

Moreover, about a week after Bulbul team posted their paper online, a different group led by Alexey Boyarsky of Leiden University in the Netherlands reported evidence for the same spectral line in XMM-Newton observations of the Andromeda galaxy. They also confirmed the line in the outskirts of the Perseus cluster.

"After we submitted the paper, theoreticians came up with about 60 different dark matter types which could explain this line. Some particle physicists have jokingly called this particle a 'bulbulon'," she laughs.

The menagerie of dark matter candidates that might produce this kind of line include axions, sterile neutrinos, and "moduli dark matter" that may result from the curling up of extra dimensions in string theory.

There is uncertainty in these results, in part, because the detection of this emission line is pushing the capabilities of both Chandra and XMM-Newton in terms of sensitivity. ​

More data and investigation will be needed to confirm both the signal's existence and nature.

The paper is here

[Josh]

Aha, that's where I left it.

Don't worry about it, just a thing I was tinkering with.

[Batman]

Waitasecond. 'Sterile' neutrinos? Does that mean ordinary neutrinos actually breed?

[Josh]

Waitasecond. 'Sterile' neutrinos? Does that mean ordinary neutrinos actually breed?

As it happens I have about fifteen gigs of porn on this very subject.

[Batman]

Well these days 15 gigs is nothing and everybody has his little fetishes but I hope you weren't expecting to cash in on that. I seriously doubt there's much of a market for movies of subatomic particles having sex while going past the camera at a considerable fraction of the speed of light.

And wow. Particle porn. And I thought the appliance porn idea me and Ms Kendall had way back when was out there.

[Josh]

Oh no, I wasn't looking to cash in.

This was for, ah, research purposes only.

[Batman]

Research into what? I mean your life, your plan to take over the universe and become a dark overlord any way you see fit, but neutrinos?
We're talking about particles the average man (or woman, or child, or pet, or pretty much everything else)'s reaction to being hit by millions of them every second is going to be...not noticing. Neutrinos are quite possibly the most useless particles ever, at least if you use the real world iteration.

[Josh]

They go everywhere and they see everything. The perfect agents.

[Batman]

They go everywhere and see everything...for a billionth of a second. And how exactly do you plan to have them actually report back?

[Josh]

If I spell it out then it's not a sinister plan, damn it. Get out there and fucking detective and don't ask me to just give you all the details over a fucking forum, geez.

[Batman]

IOW you haven't the foggiest.

[Josh]

Okay look I'm not the Riddler and I'm not going to fall for that one.

Sheesh, seventy or eighty years in, you're getting kinda lazy there Dark Knight.

[Batman]

A simple 'yes' would have sufficed and it doesn't stop being a sinister plan just because you spill it. Villains have been doing that for decades. It just means it's a sinister plan that's not gonna work because the heroes now know and will foil it.

[Josh]

It just means it's a sinister plan that's not gonna work because the heroes now know and will foil it.

Which is kind of my point here... see, new villain for a new age. Call it the Ozymandias School of Villainry.

[Batman]

Thank you for admitting Ozzy was the villain in 'Watchmen'.

[Josh]

Thank you for admitting Ozzy was the villain in 'Watchmen'.

One man's villain is another man's mass murderer.

Wait, I'm not sure that came out right.

[Batman]

Well Rorschach makes me look perfectly rational by comparison. That's pretty scary all by its lonesome.