Fast Radio Bursts


  Jonathan I. Katz  
Washington University in St. Louis.

Fast Radio Bursts are a recently discovered astronomical phenomenon, consisting of millisecond pulses of extremely bright radio-frequency (0.8--8 GHz) radiation. 

Brightness temperatures of 10^{35} K indicate coherent emission by Coulomb-scale charge "clumps".  They appear to come from the distant Universe (redshifts likely 0.05--1), but the nature of their sources is unknown.