THE source of cosmic rays, particles which bombard the Earth’s atmosphere
with astronomical amounts of energy, has eluded physicists. But perhaps that’s
because they’ve been looking in the wrong place.
The highest-energy cosmic rays pack a multi-trillion electronvolt punch when
they hit the atmosphere. Physicists assumed these rays follow a direct path to
Earth because they thought the magnetic fields between galaxies were too weak to
deflect them. But no known particle has enough energy to travel from the nearest
potential line-of-sight source and still smash into our atmosphere with such
force. Researchers have proposed numerous solutions to this puzzle,…
