Posted on 12/16/2023 7:05:09 PM PST by Libloather
Why is everyone so excited about finding another navigation aid?
You would have to know the original frequency to determine red shift. How would they know what that frequency was?
When astronomers look in their telescopes at far away galaxies and nebula, they analyze the spectrum of the light from the objects and there is a shift from what is expected from say the light from the sun. The shift also effects radio waves, gravitational waves etc.
This was discovered about a hundred years ago by a guy named Hubble and is called the Hubble effect.
By analyzing the shift in the spectrum, the red shift they can determine how far an object is away by knowing the speed of light and how long the signal takes to get here.
You still need to know the original frequency of the signal.
As the article says This signal is known as a Fast Radio Burst (FRB), a bright flash of radio LIGHT.
They are looking at the light, analyzing the spectrum and determining how far it is away from the red shift..
Basically, they are piggy backing the frequency of the signal on the light spectrum that’s why they don’t need the original frequency of the signal to determine how far away the object is.
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