IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/nature/v456y2008i7224d10.1038_nature07544.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A gravitationally lensed water maser in the early Universe

Author

Listed:
  • C. M. Violette Impellizzeri

    (Max-Planck-Institut für Radioastronomie, Auf dem Hügel 69, D-53121 Bonn, Germany)

  • John P. McKean

    (Max-Planck-Institut für Radioastronomie, Auf dem Hügel 69, D-53121 Bonn, Germany)

  • Paola Castangia

    (Max-Planck-Institut für Radioastronomie, Auf dem Hügel 69, D-53121 Bonn, Germany
    INAF-Osservatorio Astronomico di Cagliari, Loc. Poggio dei Pini, Strada 54, I-09012 Capoterra (CA), Italy)

  • Alan L. Roy

    (Max-Planck-Institut für Radioastronomie, Auf dem Hügel 69, D-53121 Bonn, Germany)

  • Christian Henkel

    (Max-Planck-Institut für Radioastronomie, Auf dem Hügel 69, D-53121 Bonn, Germany)

  • Andreas Brunthaler

    (Max-Planck-Institut für Radioastronomie, Auf dem Hügel 69, D-53121 Bonn, Germany)

  • Olaf Wucknitz

    (Argelander-Institut für Astronomie, Auf dem Hügel 71, D-53121 Bonn, Germany)

Abstract

Masers, masers everywhere Astrophysical masers are sources of stimulated spectral line emission at microwave wavelengths, analogous to the optical emissions of lasers. Water masers, emitting in the 22 GHz region from the water molecule, are found in dense molecular clouds associated with supermassive black holes in the centres of active galaxies. Based on the luminosity function for water masers derived from local examples, it was assumed that masers must be rare at intermediate and high redshifts. That assumption seems to be unfounded: with the aid of amplification by gravitational lensing, a water maser has been found at redshift 2.64 in a quasar. Its luminosity is twice that of the most powerful local water maser, and half that of the most luminous maser known. The discovery suggests that such masers were much more abundant in the early Universe than they are now.

Suggested Citation

  • C. M. Violette Impellizzeri & John P. McKean & Paola Castangia & Alan L. Roy & Christian Henkel & Andreas Brunthaler & Olaf Wucknitz, 2008. "A gravitationally lensed water maser in the early Universe," Nature, Nature, vol. 456(7224), pages 927-929, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:nature:v:456:y:2008:i:7224:d:10.1038_nature07544
    DOI: 10.1038/nature07544
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/nature07544
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/nature07544?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:nature:v:456:y:2008:i:7224:d:10.1038_nature07544. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.