Free Astronomy Magazine November-December 2019

48 NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2019 SPACE CHRONICLES U sing one cosmic mystery to probe another, astronomers analysed the signal from a fast radio burst to shed light on the diffuse gas in the halo of a massive galaxy. In November 2018 the Aus- tralian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) radio telescope pinpointed a fast radio burst, named FRB 181112. Follow-up observations with ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) and other telescopes revealed that the radio pulses have passed through the halo of a massive galaxy on their way toward Earth. This find- ing allowed astronomers to analyse Enigmatic radio burst illuminates a galaxy’s tranquil halo by ESO