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Origin of Cosmic Rays Confirmed
cats-paw writes in with news of research that seems to confirm and support current theories of how cosmic rays are created. The prevailing thinking has been that cosmic rays are generated in the regions where supernovas' shock waves interact with the interstellar medium. The new research used the variability in X-ray emissions from a supernova remnant to estimate the strength of the magnetic fields present in that environment. The results lend support to the possibility of protons and nucleii being accelerated in supernova remnants to energies of 1 PeV (10^15 eV) and beyond. Here is the abstract from Nature.
A joke modded Offtopic... oh, the indignity!
I’m old enough to remember 16K of memory being described as “whopping”