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International hunt detects ghostly neutrino from a galaxy far away

An international observatory traced a high-energy cosmic neutrino back to its origin about 4 billion light years away.

A supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way may produce neutrinos.
A supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way may produce neutrinos. (AN/Chandra X-ray Observatory Center)

GENEVA (AN) — An international observatory has for the first time traced a high-energy cosmic neutrino — an invisible, nearly massless subatomic particle — back to its origin in a distant galaxy about 4 billion light years away.

The neutrino was detected by a team of scientists working in the IceCube Neutrino Observatory built at the U.S.-operated Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station, where 5,200 sensors are buried a mile beneath the ice to find high-energy cosmic neutrinos.

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