Scientists have discovered a new radio source of unexplained origin

When observing the spiral galaxy NGC 2082, astronomers in Australia noticed a bright, compressed radio source, known as J054149.24-641813.7.

The findings of the team, led by Joel Balzan of Western Sydney University, are now available as a hard copy In arXiv’s database. According to the publication, the origin and nature of this source is still unknown, so further research on this topic is necessary.

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Previous observations of NGC 2082 were made using ASKAP (Australian Square Pathfinder Array), ATCA (Australia Telescope Compact Array) and the Parks Radio Telescope. Thanks to them, astronomers were able to discover a powerful radio source located 20 arcseconds from the galactic center.

NGC 2082 is a G-type spiral galaxy located in the constellation Goldfish. It is about 60 million light-years from Earth and has a diameter of about 33,000 light-years. Radio observations were conducted in the range from 888 MHz to 9000 MHz. Due to the specific radio index, scientists rule out a scenario in which J054149.24-641813.7 is a supernova remnant or a pulsar.

The radio source is likely to be J054149.24-641813.7 in the galaxy NGC 2082 .

A more plausible alternative explanation suggests that the source may be of thermal origin. The compact nature of J054149.24-641813.7 and its location on the periphery of NGC 2082 also provoke associations with FRBs, or high-speed radio flashes. On the other hand, this source does not seem obvious enough to make any contacts with the FRB.

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So what do the authors suggest? J054149.24-641813.7 appears to be an extragalactic background source. It could be, for example, a quasar, a radio galaxy, or an active galaxy. Flat spectrum index and relatively weak polarization at 5500 and 9000 MHz support this hypothesis. On the other hand, due to the lack of data on high-resolution neutral atomic hydrogen adsorption, these reports cannot be fully confirmed.