NCRA astronomers discover rare radio stars
The Hindu
The eight ‘Main-sequence Radio Pulse’ emitters are hotter than Sun, with unusually strong magnetic fields
In a vital discovery which will aid in the understanding of “exotic” radio stars and stellar magnetospheres, a team of astronomers from the Pune-based National Centre for Radio Astrophysics (NCRA-TIFR) have used the upgraded Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope (uGMRT) to discover eight stars belonging to a rare category called ‘Main-sequence Radio Pulse’ emitters or MRPs.
Of the total 15 MRPs known so far, 11 have been discovered by the NCRA-TIFR team alone (with three MRPs spotted by them in the recent past) thanks to the wide bandwidth and high sensitivity of the upgraded GMRT, which is a radio telescope located at Khodad in Pune district and which is operated by the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in the U.S.