Astronomers spotted 10-minute X-ray burst EP250704a 6 billion light-years away
On July 4, 2025, astronomers spotted a mysterious 10-minute X-ray burst, named EP250704a, coming from a galaxy billions of light-years away.
This flash started with gamma rays and was followed by a long X-ray glow, all of which may have come from two neutron stars colliding.
The event was picked up by the joint European-Chinese Einstein Probe and later studied using some of the world's biggest telescopes.
Niccolo Passaleva: bursts probe magnetar formation
The light from this collision traveled an incredible six billion years before reaching us. Neutron stars are what is left when massive stars collapse, and sometimes they become magnetars, stars with insanely strong magnetic fields.
As researcher Niccolo Passaleva pointed out, studying these rare bursts could help scientists figure out how often magnetars are formed through these neutron star mergers.