On Wednesday, researchers announced the discovery of a new astronomical enigma. The new object, GPM J1839–10, behaves a bit like a pulsar, sending out regular bursts of radio energy. But the physics that drives pulsars means that they’d stop emitting if they slowed down too much, and almost every pulsar we know of blinks at least once per minute.
GPM J1839–10 takes 22 minutes between pulses. We have no idea what kind of physics or what kind of objects can power that.
Magnetars are the most terrifyingly fascinating objects so far discovered. I’m cool with black holes having the ability to spaghettify me, that makes sense, that’s what gravity at an almost infinite scale does. Having something that generates a magnetic field strong enough to dis-associate my molecules I find very disconcerting.
Throw me at one at 0.99c.