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It took the world’s telescopes 10 years to find the first 30 Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs).
Using ASKAP, a team of scientists have been able to find 20 in one year.
FRBs are enigmatic flashes of radio waves first detected in 2007 (by the Parkes telescope),
but as they are unpredictable and appear to come from all parts of the sky,
catching them has required a lot of time and patience.
However ASKAP, with its wide field of view, and ability to observe in "fly's eye" mode
with each antenna observing a different patch of sky, has been able to fast-track
the detection of FRBs over the last year.
A team of scientists from Swinburne University of Technology, the OzGrav ARC Centre of Excellence,
the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research and CASS this week published
the detection of 20 FRBs in the journal Nature.
For more details, see
the CSIRO press release,
CSIRO blog,
Cosmos magazine report, or
Space.com report.
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