What caused a fleeting but highly powerful burst of radio waves that originated beyond the Milky Way? Suspects so far include the merger of neutron stars and the complete evaporation of a black hole.
The burst was discovered by David Narkevic, a student at West Virginia University in Morgantown, while searching data from the Parkes radio dish in Australia. Finding more such events could help detect ripples in space-time – which should occur when neutron stars merge. These ripples are predicted by general relativity but have never been observed.
In 5 milliseconds the burst released as much energy as the sun…
