Illustration of an ultra-high-energy cosmic ray hitting Earth Osaka Metropolitan University/L-INSIGHT, Kyoto University/Ryuunosuke Takeshige
Astronomers have detected the second most powerful cosmic ray ever recorded, but it seems to have come from an empty region of the universe known as a cosmic void, where there is nothing obvious it could have originated from.
This mysterious cosmic ray, which is probably a charged particle nucleus of some variety, such as carbon or oxygen, has been dubbed after the Japanese sun goddess.
Possible explanations for it include magnetic fields steering the particle off-course, an invisible source in another galaxy or exotic…
