A China-led team has detected the highest-energy light particle ever recorded, showing that the universe can accelerate matter to 30 times the previously predicted limit.
The particle was born in a violent binary system – known as Cygnus X-3 – in the constellation Cygnus.
That process involves a dead star stripping material from a massive companion and shooting powerful jets into space.
After travelling for nearly 30,000 years, the particle reached Earth in March 2024, where it was captured by the Large High Altitude Air Shower Observatory – a giant detector array on the eastern edge of the Tibetan Plateau.
The LHAASO team reported their discovery this month in the journal National Science Review.
Cao Zhen, LHAASO’s principal investigator at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said previous theories held that particles could be accelerated to no more than about 1 peta-electron volt (PeV), or 1 quadrillion electron volts, in star explosions or swirling black holes in the Milky Way.