Latest news with #IceCubeExperiment
Hindustan Times
4 days ago
- Science
- Hindustan Times
Mystery signals detected in Antarctica evoke hope of finding new particles: Report
Scientists have recently detected a pattern of strange signals in the sky above Antarctica. It defies current physics models and could represent a new particle, scientists told Discovered by the Antarctic Impulsive Transient Antenna (ANITA) experiment, the signal pulses were found at about 40 kilometers above the surface of the Earth. According to a report by The Pennsylvania State University(PSU), Antarctic Impulsive Transient Antenna (ANITA) comprises ranging instruments that are flown on balloons. Designed in a specialized manner to detect radio waves or subatomic particles from cosmic rays that hit the atmosphere, ANITA experiment balloons hover high above Antarctica skies. 'We use radio detectors to try to build really, really large telescopes,' said Stephanie Wissel, associate professor of physics, astronomy and astrophysics who worked on the ANITA team searching for signals from elusive particles called neutrinos. Neutrinos are a type of subatomic particle with no charge. They are abundant in the universe. Usually emitted by high-energy sources like the sun or major cosmic events like supernovas or even the Big Bang, there are neutrino signals everywhere, says the report. Wissel has designed experiments to spot neutrinos over Antarctica and South America. The new study provides enhanced context to a nearly decade-old results. Between 2016 and 2018, an ongoing ANITA experiment in Antarctica observed a series of unusual radio signals, according to an international research group that included scientists from Penn State. According to a paper published in the journal Physical Review Letters, the team said that the signal pulses had to pass through thousands of kilometers of rock before reaching the detector, that is up in the sky. This would weaken or completely stop any neutrinos or cosmic rays. The signals that were recently detected were however still strong, possibly implying that something unusual was underway. 'The radio waves that we detected nearly a decade ago were at really steep angles, like 30 degrees below the surface of the ice,' Wissel from PSU added context to the journal. Wissel further explained one possibility whereby unknown radio signal behaviour could be detected in icy or near-horizon conditions. 'My guess is that some interesting radio propagation effect occurs near ice and also near the horizon that I don't fully understand,' she said. 'Right now it's one of those long-standing mysteries,' she added. As the angle of these newly detected signals is sharper than current models of physics allow, the backtracking process isn't possible in this case, said a report by Other neutrino detectors like the IceCube Experiment and the Pierre Auger Observatory could not detect anything that could explain the new signals and their upward-oriented air shower, which defies the usual rule. The ANITA researchers have termed the newly found signals as "anomalous," affirming that they were not caused by neutrinos.
Hindustan Times
5 days ago
- Science
- Hindustan Times
Strange, unexplained signals detected from Antarctic ice: Here's what scientists say
A team of researchers trying to locate neutrinos in the Antarctic stumbled upon unusual radio signals coming from below the Earth's surface rather than space. The Antarctic Impulsive Transient Antenna (ANITA), a range of equipment flown up on a balloon to capture waves from cosmic rays before they strike the Earth's surface, picked up the signals. This occurrence is contrary to the current commonly accepted norms of particle physics. The transmissions were caught from 30 degrees below the ice surface- a phenomenon quite uncommon for neutrinos. Stephanie Wissel, an astrophysicist at Penn State University and part of the team, said in her results journal, 'It's an interesting problem because we still don't actually have an explanation for what those anomalies are, but what we do know is that they're most likely not representing neutrinos.' According to the team's calculations, neutrino signals are highly unlikely to be detected despite their widespread availability. The signals would have had to pass through thousands of kilometers of rock before being recorded, which makes the possibility incredibly low. 'You have a billion neutrinos passing through your thumbnail at any moment, but neutrinos don't really interact. So, this is the double-edged sword problem. If we detect them, it means they have traveled all this way without interacting with anything else. We could be detecting a neutrino coming from the edge of the observable universe,' Wissel added. Given its secluded location and minimal interference from other signals, the Antarctic was picked as the backdrop of this study. Speaking about how the ANITA works, Wissel said, 'We have these radio antennas on a balloon that flies 40 kilometers above the ice in Antarctica. We point our antennas down at the ice and look for neutrinos that interact in the ice, producing radio emissions that we can then sense on our detectors.' After cross-referencing the data picked up by ANITA with two other independent detectors namely the IceCube Experiment and the Pierre Auger Observatory, the team found that the results didn't match. The signal has now been described as 'anomalous' and confirmed not to be a result of neutrino activity. 'My guess is that some interesting radio propagation effect occurs near ice and also near the horizon that I don't fully understand, but we certainly explored several of those, and we haven't been able to find any of those yet either,' Wissel noted. 'So, right now, it's one of these long-standing mysteries, and I'm excited that when we fly PUEO, we'll have better sensitivity. In principle, we should pick up more anomalies, and maybe we'll actually understand what they are. We also might detect neutrinos, which would in some ways be a lot more exciting.' Several plausible theories to explain the incident have been provided with some suggesting the existence of dark matter and unknown radio wave behavior due to the ice and proximity to the horizon. However, no concrete answer has been reached.
