{
  "id": 13381436,
  "title": "A starquake 10 billion years ago may have just sent a flash to Earth",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/10/10/a-starquake-10-billion-years-ago-may-have-just-sent-a-flash-to-earth",
  "topic": "science",
  "section": "Science",
  "published": "2026-10-10T09:30:00.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Mashable",
    "slug": "mashable",
    "url": "https://mashable.com/science/james-webb-space-telescope-most-distant-fast-radio-burst-confirmed"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "A radio telescope in South Africa detected a flash of radio waves that had traveled over 10 billion years to reach Earth, setting a new record for the farthest fast radio burst (FRB) ever observed. FRBs are brief, intense bursts of energy that last only milliseconds and have stumped scientists as to their origins. Most FRBs occur once and are challenging to track down. The MeerKAT radio telescope in South Africa, led by a team from the University of Sydney, detected this particular burst on March 4, 2024, dubbed FRB 20240304B.\n\nFollowing attempts to locate the burst's source using the world's largest ground-based telescopes, the team turned to NASA's James Webb Space Telescope. The FRB was traced to a faint galaxy from the early universe, approximately 3 billion years old, which is more than double the distance of the previous record. This discovery indicates that FRBs can be traced much farther back in time, providing a new tool to explore the early universe.\n\nThe galaxy hosting the burst was unexpectedly small, containing about 1,000 times less mass than expected from a typical FRB host. It was active in star formation during a period known as \"cosmic noon,\" when the universe produced stars at a much faster rate than at any other time. This finding may help explain the cause of these bursts, a mystery that has puzzled astronomers for years.\n\nTwo leading hypotheses for the cause of FRBs involve neutron stars. One suggests that bursts occur during the collision of two neutron stars, but this slow merger process takes billions of years and would likely be observed in mature galaxies. The other hypothesis proposes that magnetars, which are young, highly magnetized neutron stars, cause FRBs when the strain from their powerful magnetic fields causes their solid iron crust to fracture, similar to an Earthquake. This scenario aligns with the properties of the FRB's host galaxy, which has few heavy elements, suggesting its early age and supporting the magnetar hypothesis.",
  "summary": "NASA's James Webb Space Telescope traces the farthest fast radio burst yet, and its galaxy reveals a clue to what causes them.",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}