AstroFlash

AstroFlash

AstroFlash is a NWO Vici grant (€1.5M awarded for five years) to precisely localise and characterise fast radio bursts (FRBs) as well as other astrophysical transients. The EVN is used to localise FRBs on milliarcsecond scales in order to unveil the host galaxies and local environments of these enigmatic sources.

JIVE Participation

JIVE provides a scientific and technical participation in this project. Several JIVE members (A. Keimpema, B. Marcote, Z. Paragi) are involved in the follow up of known repeating FRBs with the EVN to localize them down to the milliarcsecond level. This involves observing proposals, and correlating-only proposals, sent to the EVN. A technical participation is also present with further developments of the SFXC correlator to handle new correlation modes: de-dispersion of the data, and the availability of much shorter time integrations from the baseband data.

JIVE Main Contact

Benito Marcote

Website

https://astroflash-frb.github.io

ASTROFLASH NEWS

Cosmic flashes pinpointed to a surprising location in space

23/02/2022
Astronomers have been surprised by the closest source of mysterious flashes in the sky called fast radio bursts. Precision measurements with radio telescopes reveal that the bursts are made among old stars, and in a way that no one was expecting. The source of the flashes, in nearby spiral galaxy M 81, is the closest of its kind to Earth. The research including the participation of JIVE researchers has been published today in two papers in Nature and Nature Astronomy.

Famous fast radio burst FRB20180916B just barely lets itself be captured

10/05/2021
Two international teams of astronomers (with significant JIVE involvement) have narrowed-down the origin of the flashes produced in the famous fast radio burst FRB20180916B by examining them with the highest time resolution and at the lowest possible frequencies.
Localisation of FRBs

AstroFlash project to localise FRBs

23/03/2021
Jason Hessels will build a research group of PhD students and postdocs hosted at ASTRON, JIVE and the University of Amsterdam. Hessels' previous research activities have been funded, in part, by NWO Veni and Vidi grants, which together with the Vici form the "NWO-Talentprogramma''.