spacetoday.net: Astronomers links cosmic rays to supernova

Posted: Fri, Nov 5, 2004, 8:07 PM ET (0107 GMT)
Astronomers reported this week that cosmic rays — high-energy particles first detected in the Earth's upper atmosphere a century ago — appear to be generated by a supernova explosion. Astronomers reached this conclusion with the first image generated exclusively from gamma rays, taken from data obtained at the High Energy Spectroscopic System (HESS), an array of telescopes in Namibia that observe the visible light created when gamma rays interact with molecules in the atmosphere. That image shows the production of gamma rays from the shock wave of a supernova that exploded 1,000 years ago; those gamma rays imply that the remnant is also creating cosmic rays by accelerating particles to velocities near the speed of light. Astronomers had long suspected that supernovae were at least one source of cosmic rays, but before these observations had no evidence to support that claim.