Scientists spotted the most powerful cosmic ray seen in more than three decades and named it Oh-my-God.
The exact source and origin of this supercharged particle from the space remains a mystery, with some suggesting it could have been created by someone unknown to us physics energy.
The enigmatic cosmic ray had an estimated energy of about 240 hexa-electron volts (One EeV (exa-electronvolt) = 1018 eV (electronvolt)), making it comparable to the most powerful cosmic ray ever detected.
When it was discovered in 1991 it was measured at about 320 EeV. The findings were published today in Science.
A cosmic ray, despite its name, is actually a high-energy subatomic particle, often a proton, that travels through space at a speed close to the speed of light.
In their extremely high-energy form, cosmic rays have energy levels in excess of one EeV, which is about a million times greater than those achieved by the most powerful man-made particle accelerators. Cosmic rays with energies above 100 EeV are rarely detected, and less than one per century of these particles reach every square kilometer of Earth."
