Scientists find more bright blasts of energy coming from space – and they’re getting closer to...

Scientists have detected two bright radio bursts from a magnetar in our galaxy, as they get closer to discovering the source of the blasts.

Earlier this month, scientists discovered that fast radio bursts were coming from the object, in a major breakthrough in the search for the source of those mysterious blasts of energy. It was the first time an FRB had been detected coming from inside our Milky Way, and also the first time such a blast had been traced back to a particular source.

Now scientists say they have found new bursts coming from that same magnetar. That should help further indicate whether it is really a source of FRBs – and whether the same process could be powering those bursts we have discovered coming from elsewhere in the universe.

Fast radio bursts are very short, very powerful blasts of radio energy that are sent through the universe. Though they are as short as a fraction of a millisecond, they can send out as much energy as the Sun does in days – they are mostly unpredictable, but some have been found on a repeating schedule.