Abnormal gamma explosions betray the formation of a very strange star

If this news was confirmed, it would be one of the greatest astrophysical discoveries since 1967 and the detection of the First pulsar by Jocelyn Bell ! A team of Chinese astronomers and astrophysicists has just announced in An Arxiv publication Hold clues indicating the first detection of a “strange” star, a type of sun planned by theory for a long time.

A strange star, also called Strange Strange Or the quarks star, would be the densest material known throughout the universe, twice as much as a neutron star. To better represent the phenomenon, let us recall that the density of the latter is equivalent to 1 billion tonnes in the volume of a six-sided die, or 25,000 aircraft carriers Charles de Gaulle !

A quarks star would be about twice as much as a neutron star, a 10 km diameter ball containing the material of one or two of our sun. Its surface temperature would be around 50,000 ° C, or even 100,000 ° C. Its lifespan, of the order of 100 billion years, would also make it the most stable star of the whole universe.

To understand why this type of star should exist, you should know that matter is made up of neutrons and protons, themselves made up of quarkselementary particles divided into six classes. Some quarks are called “strange quarks”, and this is this type of particles in question here. Their name comes from the fact that these quarks have an abnormally long lifespan, hence the apparent strangeness for the physicists who discovered them.

Gravitational collapse produces a stellar residue

This is the power of gravitational collapsemainly depending on the mass of the star, which will produce a particular type of stellar residue, either a white dwarf, or a neutron star, or a black hole. But between these last two, there is a small theoretical place for the quarter star, alias “strange star”.

According to Chinese scientists, GRB 240529a (for Gamma Ray Burst), detected by the NASA Swift Telescope, has issued a triple signal characteristic of what would be expected in the case of a star of a strange star. The three gamma flashes – high frequency electromagnetic radiation – spaced a few hundred seconds, would testify to a scenario established as follows:

• 1/ Collapse of the star in neutron star (magnetar type, that is to say with an extreme magnetic field). Relative calm, then the continuous collapse …
• 2/ collapse of the neutron star in strange star. Relative calm, then …
• 3/ The strange star dissipates part of its immense rotation energy in the radiation of an absolutely gigantic magnetic field.

However, this is the type of signal that we hoped theoretically capture in the context of the formation of a strange star.

Until now, other candidates for the status of strange stars had been put forward, but better measures, in particular their radius, had made it possible to rule out this possibility (in the case of RX J1856.5-3754For example).

Given the major impact of such a discovery on theoretical and stellar physics, the future will soon tell us if we have found the first stars at quarks in our cosmic bestiary!