eso0923 — Science Release Milky Way's super-efficient particle
accelerators caught in the act 25 June 2009 Thanks to a unique
"ballistic study" that combines data from ESO's Very Large
Telescope and NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, astronomers have
now solved a long-standing mystery of the Milky Way’s particle
accelerators. They show in a paper published today on Science
Express that cosmic rays from our galaxy are very efficiently
accelerated in the remnants of exploded stars. During the Apollo
flights astronauts reported seeing odd flashes of light, visible
even with their eyes closed. We have since learnt that the cause
was cosmic rays — extremely energetic particles from outside the
Solar System arriving at the Earth, and constantly bombarding
its atmosphere. Once they reach Earth, they still have
sufficient energy to cause glitches in electronic components.
Galactic cosmic rays come from sources inside our home galaxy,
the Milky Way, and consist mostly of protons moving at close to
the speed of light, t