Magnetars: How Magnetic Fields Fool Light ⚡ экспресс
Magnetars are stars with monstrously strong magnetic fields. As it turns out, in such fields, light behaves oddly: its trajectory bends, as if passing through an invisible lens. If we don't account for this, we misjudge the star's size by a whole 10%. So, do magnetars hide even more secrets, twisting our observations?
Neutron stars are the ultra-dense remnants of stars, where matter is compressed to the limit described by Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar. Magnetars are a type of neutron star with a magnetic field a quadrillion times stronger than Earth's. Normally, light passing a massive body bends because spacetime is warped—it acts like a gravitational lens. But in magnetars, the field adds a second lens: the light bends even more. It's like looking through glasses with double lenses: one from gravity, one from magnetism. Without accounting for the second lens, the error in radius reaches 10%.
Future telescopes, analyzing the flicker of pulsars (discovered by Jocelyn Bell Burnell), will refine neutron star sizes. This will unlock the secrets of ultra-dense matter inaccessible on Earth. And 10% isn't just a number: for a neutron star, it's the line between stability and collapse into a black hole.
🎯 A magnetar with a 10¹⁵ G field can demagnetize all bank cards within 100,000 km—a quarter of the way to the Moon.