Strange Radio Bursts From 11 Billion Light-Years Away Puzzle Scientists

There's something out there in the universe causing mysterious radio bursts, and the only thing scientists know about it is that it's from a long, long time ago.

An international team of astronomers have ruled out any Earthly origins for the strange, short-lived radio bursts, and while they haven't pinpointed a specific source, they do know it must have come from some kind of violent cosmic event involving players like neutron stars and black holes.  The team published their findings in a study in the journal Science.

"A single burst of radio emission of unknown origin was detected outside our Galaxy about six years ago but no one was certain what it was or even if it was real, so we have spent the last four years searching for more of these explosive, short-duration radio bursts," said study leader Dan Thornton, a Ph.D. student at the University of Manchester in England.

"This paper describes four more bursts, removing any doubt that they are real. The radio bursts last for just a few milliseconds and the furthest one that we detected was 11 billion light years away."

The mysterious nature of these bursts has scientists puzzled, but they are sure of one thing: there should be plenty more of the same to study. In fact, there should be one of these short-lived radio bursts hitting us every 10 seconds.

"The bursts last only a tenth of the blink of an eye. With current telescopes we need to be lucky to look at the right spot at the right time. But if we could view the sky with 'radio eyes' there would be flashes going off all over the sky every day," explained Michael Kramer, director of the Max-Planck Institute.