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Using the NICER telescope on the International Space Station, researchers determined that the pulsar in the Crab Nebula releases millisecond-long pulses of radio waves, called giant radio pulses, that are accompanied by X-ray surges.
Giant radio pulses and X-ray surges are coming from the Crab Nebula
The hauntingly beautiful Crab Nebula, located 6,500 light-years away in the Taurus constellation, is releasing an incredible amount of energy.
The nebula is six light-years wide, and it’s a growing cloud of debris formed from a supernova explosion. (A light-year is six trillion miles).
The light from this supernova first reached Earth in July 1054 and was witnessed by astronomers in Japan and China.
When the star exploded, it formed a neutron star, which is the dense core of a star that is about the size of a city like Chicago. This became a pulsar, or rapidly spinning neutron star, that is now located in the nebula.