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Point-Counterpoint, Sports

Point-counterpoint: Is bowling a sport?

by Gabe Nisker, Jack Armstrong on

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This week, The McGill Tribune placed an incredibly contentious issue on the debate floor: Is bowling a sport? The answer is less clear than you may think. 

 

Bowling is just like any other sport

Gabe Nisker

Bowling, on a surface level, seems fairly accessible: Grab some buddies, beer, and a pair of clown shoes and head down to the alley. But that is where the Professional Bowlers Association tricks you. Its design is accessible, but once you’re in, you’re in. Underneath the surface, the sport––yes, it is a sport––is ruthless, competitive, and challenging to the highest degree.

Bowling is likely the oiliest sport out there, but that slick quality makes it all the more difficult for one to succeed. Every bowling lane is coated in oil to protect it from catching fire. Most recreational bowling uses “house” coating, which helps funnel the ball toward the centre of the lane for greater shot success. Professional bowling uses a “sport” pattern, a more even distribution of oil across the surface that allows for little margin of error, which makes every shot a precise calculation. 

According to Nick Bonahan, the sports performance specialist for the United States Bowling Congress, being an elite athlete alone is not enough to make you an elite bowler. However, elite bowlers are always elite athletes with impressive leg strength, flexibility, balance, and control. Their adaptability makes each shot—unique due to the changing oil surface—a different challenge that bowlers are well-equipped to handle. The physical and mental difficulty of hurling bowling balls at around 20 miles per hour regularly for 10 frames is not to be understated. The combination of mental and physical makes bowling similar to other sports, such as hockey or basketball, whose legitimacy as a sport is never questioned.  

 

Bowling is nothing more than a casual weekend activity

Jack Armstrong

According to the Cambridge Dictionary, a sport is “a game, competition, or activity needing physical effort and skill that is played or done according to rules, for enjoyment and/or as a job.” 

Bowling is played according to rules, and it can be played for enjoyment or a job, but it requires almost no physical effort. Many people compare the physical exertion of bowling to the established sport of golf, but in reality, golf is noticeably more physical. The only motions required to be proficient in bowling are walking a few paces and rolling a ball less than 20 metres down a slick surface. Almost anyone can do it. In golf, however, a player must be able to hit a ball nearly 180 metres in order to be considered any good. This requires an enormously forceful swing that not everyone can accomplish–and that is the key difference between the two activities. 

This is not to say that there is no skill to be observed in bowling: There is obviously a gap between good and bad bowlers. However, the skills used in bowling are overwhelmingly mental, much like the game of chess, which is is decidedly not a sport. Knowing where to throw the ball and how much spin to apply is so much more important than how hard you throw the ball, which is why players almost always roll strikes in professional games: They know exactly where to throw the ball. Knowing where to put the bowling ball, however, is not a physical skill. Since bowling’s skill set is overwhelmingly mental, rather than physical, it should be considered a fun activity for all ages but not a sport. 

 

Editor’s Pick

Bowling is an activity that is generally not associated with superhuman athleticism or intense competition and cash prizes. But the reality is that both of these elements that are intrinsic to professional sports exist in bowling. Bowling is a sport and should be afforded the appropriate respect. 

Commentary, Opinion

White activists—stop hijacking social movements

by Rachel Habrih on

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The future Black, Indigenous, and other people of colour (BIPOC) imagine for themselves is always in relation to their present-day lived experiences. Since June 2019, students have been expressing their discontent with Bill 21—McGill students consistently rally for climate justice, but the campus’s attention is not given to all causes. On Sept. 25 2019, the Arts Undergraduate Society (AUS) voted to strike in support of the Sept. 27 climate march: Roughly 900 members of AUS showed up, surpassing the 500 needed to reach quorum. However, only 90 students attended the Jan. 17  AUS General Assembly (GA) to strike against Bill 21––a law banning public sector employees, such as bus drivers, teachers, and police officers, from wearing any kind of visible religious symbols. Often, campus activism is white activism, and students need to diversify their causes to create substantial change.  

Even when they show up for issues that affect racialized students, white students too often rally behind causes that also affect them. When white activists take a stand, sometimes it takes space from marginalized voices: For example, during the September Climate Strike, because of the presence of exclusionary white activists who participated in ways which were alienating, BIPOC felt unsafe: Members of the climate activist group Extinction Rebellion aggressively barged through a group of Indigenous activists in order to make their way to the front of the march. 

Proven by the failure of AUS to meet quorum on Jan. 17, it is difficult to raise momentum for causes at McGill if white allies choose not to mobilize: White students did not show up to the GA, and as a result, there was no strike. 

White students shouldn’t rally solely for movements that affect their futures; the future white activists are striving for is a future that BIPOC have not even begun to imagine. Many BIPOC, such as victims of war, are focussing on surviving for tomorrow. By failing to use their privilege to uplift BIPOC in their activism, white activists hijack social movements by placing themselves and their feelings at the centre of every cause. White activists must, therefore, make an active effort to diversify their movements in order to create safer and more inclusive activist spaces for BIPOC.

“By failing to use their privilege to uplift BIPOC in their activism, white activists hijack social movements by placing themselves and their feelings at the centre of every cause.”

Having specific demands can help accomplish goals in activist movements, however, when these demands become too insular they can also turn multifaceted movements into one-dimensional issues. Activist groups should seek to articulate practical aims for themselves while also acknowledging the complex context that accompanies ethical issues. Often campaigns headed by white activists are guilty of having ‘tunnel-vision’ which prevents them from addressing injustice comprehensively. For example, Divest McGill—an environmental justice group—was created with the goal of focussing on fossil fuel divestment; but solely focussing on one aspect of McGill’s unethical investments distracts from all the other investments the university has in other domains, notably in the military-industrial complex and the illegal occupation of Palestine. Divestment, therefore, means more than just divesting from fossil fuels: It means divesting from all unethical industries.  

The complexity of injustice expands to issues beyond climate change. Since the passage of Bill 21, there has been an increase in hate crimes towards racialized people, and McGill’s campus is not safe from hate either. Bill 21 is an example of institutionalized racism, and although the CAQ claims that the policy is part of its effort to secularize Quebec, it has the opposite effect: Bill 21 limits the religious freedom of racialized communities. With the passing of the law, racialized students are reminded that they are not welcome in Quebec, as well as at McGill, because of the university’s inability to properly respond to the law. 

White activists must alter their perspectives on injustice to recognize nuance. If one wishes to truly call themselves a climate activist, they should recognize the intersectionalities of climate change and war. POLI 339––a comparative political science course which is taught for half its term at McGill and for the other half in Israel––is an example of an issue with multiple intersections. Israel is a settler-colonial state and has been accused of greenwashing––a practice involving pretending to be ‘environmentally friendly’ in order to cover criminal activity. Despite students democratically showing discontent by voting against the authorization of the course, the AUS Executive Committee overturned the decision, and the course is being offered for a second time this Summer. The existence of a course like POLI 339 makes Palestinian and other Arab students feel unsafe on campus and this is a notion which has not been given enough attention in the on-campus narrative surrounding the course. POLI 339 is another example of why one who wishes to truly be an ally must include BIPOC issues in their activism. 

Injustice is intersectional by its very nature: It can manifest through race, gender, class, colonialism, migration, and war. Yet, these complexities are often dismissed by white activists. White allies should show up, but show up acknowledging their own positionality, and stand in the back. Let BIPOC be the leaders of their own fights—that is what being an ally means.

“White allies should show up, but show up acknowledging their own positionality, and stand in the back. Let BIPOC be the leaders of their own fights—that is what being an ally means.”

Off the Board, Opinion

Finding solitude in a digital world

by Lucas Bird, Opinion Editor on

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I am astonishingly bad at being alone. I mean this in every possible interpretation of that phrase. I struggle at being comfortably single as opposed to being in committed relationships. I experience anxiety if I go a large portion of the day without talking to or interacting with someone else. With these things in mind, I have chosen to live in an apartment in the Plateau with four other people for the last two years. When I walk north along my street to return home at the end of the day and see a darkness emanating from the front window signifying that none of my roommates are around or awake, I feel dismayed. However, over the last several months, I have been trying to do more things that I find difficult, and one of those is spending time by myself. In doing so, I have come to appreciate the significance of time spent untethered from others. However, I have also confronted some of the harsh realities of attempting to be truly alone in the era of social media.

In his New Yorker piece “Farther Away,” Jonathan Franzen, one of the preeminent fiction writers of the last 20 years, discusses solitude as it manifests itself in literature, tracing its increase in thematic frequency with the rise of the contemporary novel. However, he also addresses solitude as he seeks to experience it in his personal life, noting how the explosion of the internet age has produced unique forms of isolation, ones previously inaccessible to the global populace which members of the smartphone generation are now uniquely privy to. Franzen’s argument does not share any intellectual territory with stereotypical anti-smartphone, Boomer sentiments. He writes about the internet as something which has transformed how human beings think of themselves as individuals. While the rise of individualism in the modern-novel created a similar mechanism, one that maps ‘the-self’ onto a narrative, the internet has taken that relationship and made it global, mapping ‘the-self’ onto an entirely digital world. 

The ability to access an infinite network of millions of people at any time and in any location is a reality of contemporary life. One of the most overlooked ways that smartphones and social media have altered the course of humanity is by making the experience of true solitude nearly impossible. Validation is the foundation upon which all social media platforms operate. It feels powerfully satisfying to tell others, in words or pictures, what you might be doing or thinking at any given moment. Inversely, seeing into the worlds of your friends or acquaintances through the lens of Instagram or Facebook results in a gratifying feeling of inclusion, of being ‘in-the-know.’ Through social media, we gain shallow recognition of our own behaviors and we get to appreciate the sepia-filtered lives of our peers. Both dynamics make us feel special and both make us feel like we are not alone. And yet, one of the supreme tragedies of the 21st century is that we have begun to live in a world where people rarely feel alone, because feeling alone is so important. Without solitude, people do not have the opportunity to introspect and truly understand themselves.

One aspect of solitude I have come to value is the fundamental role it plays in self-development. Spending time in isolation, entirely unstimulated, initiates a species of reflection which is alien to more social circumstances. This kind of reflection, one in which we carefully examine our own identity, thoughts, and behaviors can be an intimidating prospect. However, introspection is the singular component that makes personal growth a positive process. It is the times where we find ourselves bored, restless, and perhaps even uncomfortable with being so solitary that we make significant discoveries about who we are and who we want to become. Social media is taking these discoveries away from us. I worry about becoming more intent on maintaining illusive linkages to others than understanding myself. 

I am scared that the defining aspects of individuality are being stripped away, melted down, and reformed into a collective digital consciousness. I hope that as we move forward into a connection-defined era, we take the time to become reacquainted with solitude, and in doing so, come to know ourselves. 

 

Basketball, Sports

Cabillo-Abante shines for Martlet Basketball at Beach Night

by Karan Kumar on

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Martlet Basketball (6–8) lost in a thrilling double-overtime match on Feb. 6 against the Bishop’s Gaiters (8–5) by a final score of 77–69.

The first quarter started with Bishop’s gaining a steady lead over McGill. A three-pointer from fifth-year guard Geraldine Cabillo-Abante got the Martlets back into the game, and they owned a 12–9 lead at the end of the first quarter. The Martlets held this lead through the end of the half, ahead by a score of 27–24. 

After half-time, however, the tide turned against the Martlets. Bishop’s was back in front 42–40 at the end of the third quarter. The Gaiters carried on this momentum into the fourth quarter, exposing holes in McGill’s defence. The Martlets trailed 44–50 with only five minutes remaining in the fourth quarter but later reduced the deficit to three points (53–56) with only 15 seconds to play. A brilliant shot from second-year guard Delphine Robitaille tied the score at 56 with a three-pointer at the buzzer. 

The game went into overtime, where both teams put up a good effort for the full five minutes. One overtime period was not enough to separate the two sides, however, and the game went to a second with a 63–63 score. Bishop’s dominated in the second overtime, taking the win with a final score of 77–69.

Martlets Head Coach Ryan Thorne was disappointed with the team’s performance, citing a need for more disciplined play.

“We had 32 turnovers in the game, and I think that is ridiculous,” Thorne said. “We let them dictate what was going to happen. We gave up offensive rebounds. They had 16 offensive rebounds, [and] they were better than us. We had a game plan, [but] so many times in the game, we did not execute it.” 

Cabillo-Abante agreed that the team did not adhere to the game plan.

“If we are not sticking to the plan, then that’s going to hurt us,” Cabillo-Abante said.  

Robitaille noted the importance of perseverance in close games.

“Basketball is a game full of ups and downs,” Robitaille said. “When you are down, it’s not a matter of staying down. It’s what you do to get back up. We fought, but not [until] the end.”

The Martlets next play at home when they face cross-town rival Concordia (4–9) on Feb. 15. 

 

Moment of the game

With only three seconds left in the fourth quarter and the Martlets down by three, fifth-year guard Gladys Hakizimana hauled in a critical offensive rebound and found second-year guard Delphine Robitaille behind the line to drain a stunning three-pointer and send the game to overtime.

Quotable

“I think [the players and the fans] have different viewpoints on what the game was. The fans see this as an exciting game. Double overtime, that’s exciting. But […] I do not think we played well.” – Head Coach Ryan Thorne on the team’s performance. 

Stat Corner

McGill shot a sweltering 37 per cent from three and 91.7 per cent from the free throw line, but 32 per cent on field goals was too poor to overcome. 

Creative

The resurgence of film photography

by Alex Hinton and Zoe Lubetkin on

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Staff producer Alex Hinton and contributor Zoe Lubetkin meet with Montreal photography studios and film photographers to explore their take on the resurgence of analogue photography.

Video my Alex Hinton and Zoe Lubetkin

 

Sports

Know Your Athlete: Camille Vibert

by Shaun Lalani on

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A mountain undergoes several rounds of deterioration and decay over time. Piece by piece, the cliffs chip away and the rocks weather, but when the snow settles and the trees fill in, the mountain, continues to stand strong. Such is the spirit of Camille Vibert, a second-year alpine skier from Orillia, Ontario, who is a natural-born athlete and a symbol of fortitude to those around her. The RSEQ Rookie of the Year has faced and conquered several hurdles over her career, and when it comes to the question of her legacy, she is only just getting started. 

“I didn’t really have high expectations for [skiing] last year,” Vibert said in an interview with The McGill Tribune. “I just kind of wanted to continue [skiing] and have fun with it, just love it again. [But] then I ended up having a pretty solid season, so yeah, […] the ceiling’s pretty high.” 

Vibert credits her confidence and success, in large part, to the many obstacles that have shaped her competitive personality over the years. 

“[I] would always get mad at card games,” Vibert said. “[I was] just always fighting for everything. I wanted to be the best at everything. But when I was 13, I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes. I had to be independent, even more so than I already was. It was difficult, of course, but it made me more responsible as a person. So, that was what really shaped me as a person—not wanting to give up, ever.”

Vibert maintained this drive throughout high school, excelling in several sports. Her talent in skiing eventually earned her a spot on the provincial ski team. Her time with the team was tumultuous, however, as she suffered a career-threatening ACL and meniscus tear in her very first race. 

“I didn’t really mesh well with [the coaches] and [then] […] there were also all the injuries,” Vibert said. “After a while […], I [realized] that I wasn’t really [skiing] for me but for others and their expectations.” 

Vibert worked her way back to health, ready to take her next big step. With the aim of rediscovering her passion for skiing, she chose to continue her career at McGill. 

“I wasn’t really enjoying skiing for a while but wanted to rediscover my love for it,” Vibert said. “McGill has a competitive skiing program plus […], I’ve always wanted to explore in Montreal, [..] so it was a no-brainer really. My grandpa would be proud that I’m practicing my French, though.” 

As for her life outside of sports, McGill has been quite a ride for the skier. 

“Oh, it’s so busy,” Vibert said. “I am a very social person, and […] I just love going out and enjoying all the events like Hype [Week] and Carnival. But it’s obviously hard to balance with everything. Skiing, I find, helps me manage my time. The added pressure just forces me to keep things in check, and I sort of just need to keep going, going, going, or […] else I just shut down.” 

With a month remaining before the RSEQ championship at Mount Stoneham on Mar. 13 and 14, Vibert remains calm and composed. 

“I have a bit more expectations for this year [and] just a little more pressure, but honestly, I just want to have fun with skiing,” Vibert said. “It’s just really fun, and I’m happy to be able to be doing it while studying.” 

Life after graduation remains an open-ended question. She has professed a love for psychology but has promised to remain an active sportsperson. Despite the lingering uncertainty, one thing seems clear: Vibert will continue to conquer every obstacle in her way. 

“It’s kind of funny because my brother, when I first got diagnosed with diabetes, he [came] to me and he [said], ‘Your pancreas is a quitter, but you’re not,’” Vibert said. “So, that’s sort of my motto. If life knocks you down, you just gotta keep getting back up.”

Research Briefs, Science & Technology

Soil carbon levels still recovering from Mayan deforestation

by Amir Hotter Yishay on

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Approximately 4,000 years ago, in modern-day southern Mexico and Central America, the Mayan civilization arose and, in due time, spread. Over thousands of years, the Mayans developed a highly sophisticated urban society, numbering 19 million people at its peak. The Mayans built and thrived in dense, teeming metropolises, erecting giant limestone pyramids that continue to draw throngs of tourists to this day. Yet, when the Spanish arrived in the 16th century, they found a landscape dotted with empty cities and opulent ruins. For years, the demise of the Maya puzzled scientists and historians alike. 

Scientists now believe that a series of droughts beginning in the eighth century AD, exacerbated by the effects of deforestation, pushed the Mayans toward collapse. Crops failed, cities fell, and the people fled to the coast. 

Today, new field methods are allowing scientists to peer into the past to better understand not only the factors leading to the Mayan collapse, but the enduring consequences of their actions, all the more unsettling in light of ongoing efforts to curb climate change.

The capacity of trees to sequester carbon is well understood: Reforestation on a mass scale has been touted time and time again as a crucial measure against global heating. However, the role that soils play in carbon cycling remains relatively under-researched despite the fact that the soils of the world hold over twice as much carbon as the atmosphere. When trees are felled or burned to make way for pasture or crop land, much of the carbon held in the trees and soil is released into the atmosphere. Some postulate that this release of sequestered carbon can be countered with the regrowth of previously denuded forest. However, a study published in Nature Geoscience in 2018 suggests otherwise.

Peter Douglas, an assistant professor in McGill’s Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, was part of the team analyzing plant wax lipids in lakebed sediments for the study. These organic molecules, produced by plants, have a tendency to bind to minerals within the soil before they are eventually washed away. 

Douglas found a curious discrepancy between the ages of the plant waxes and the sediments that they were found in. The team discovered that this gap varied greatly from one period of time to the next; on the whole, the plant waxes were far older than the sediment. 

“Basically, [the plant wax lipids] give us a picture of how long carbon is sitting in soils,” Douglas said in an interview with The McGill Tribune. “Soils are a huge carbon reservoir on the planet [….] But we don’t really know how that kind of storage reservoir changes over time, especially on long time scales. What we found is that it really decreased a lot over the course of Mayan history.”

Douglas believes that the findings indicate that Mayan deforestation sped up the movement of soil carbon into lake beds: The soil retained carbon for far less time than it had prior. 

“What is perhaps even more interesting is that when the Maya had major depopulation and the forest grew back, the age of the carbon didn’t go back up,” Douglas said. “The soils did not regain their capacity to store carbon on long time scales.”

This means that reforestation, while helpful in recapturing atmospheric carbon, might not be quite the silver bullet some have hoped. In the meantime, further research on long-term soil carbon storage capacity is in order. 

“For the time being, scientists are unaware if this is a widespread phenomenon,” Douglas said. 

If so, it does not bode especially well for humanity. According to Douglas, the findings suggest that it might take a very long time, upwards of thousands of years, to fully rebalance carbon storage levels in soils. In the meantime, one can only hope that our own civilization will avert the fate faced by the Maya.

Science & Technology

Understanding the coronavirus

by Owen Dunkley on

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The World Health Organization (WHO) designated the novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) outbreak a public health emergency on Jan. 30, garnering increased attention from world leaders and national public health agencies. As concerns over the spread and severity of a wider 2019-nCoV outbreak continue to grow, researchers around the globe are working to understand the virus and develop new treatments as quickly as possible. 

On Dec. 31, China announced a small outbreak in the city of Wuhan of 27 patients with viral pneumonia. The first entire genome of the virus was sequenced on Jan. 10, and by Jan. 23, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) had announced that they were expecting to have a vaccine available within 16 weeks. While confirmed 2019-nCoV cases had skyrocketed past 11,000 by the end of the month, many countries established strong quarantine measures and were working on new methods to fight the virus. 

International and national health agencies’ immediate strategies to fight the ongoing spread of 2019-nCoV stand in stark contrast with previous global responses to past outbreaks. Dr. Brian Ward, a professor in the Department of Medicine at McGill, expressed his approval of how health officials have responded to the novel coronavirus. Ward cited increased preparedness in vaccine development frameworks and international cooperation as the major reasons for this early success. 

“2014 and 2015 was a watershed [in the Ebola outbreak],” Ward said in an interview with The McGill Tribune. “The West-African Ebola outbreak was a big deal, because the pattern up until then had been an explosion [of a given infectious disease], followed by a scrambling to mobilize millions of dollars to get manufacturers to produce a vaccine, and then the virus was gone [before vaccines could return a profit].” 

Prior to the 2014-15 Ebola outbreak, international strategies were largely focussed on ongoing threats to public safety, with little funding going towards the development of vaccines for diseases that had not yet infected humans. 

In the wake of that crisis, several governments and funding agencies identified the need for a centralized plan for developing and deploying new vaccines to prevent dangerous viruses and bacteria from entering the human population. CEPI was founded in Norway in 2017 as an international partnership of philanthropic and governmental foundations that agreed to direct continued funding to research for vaccine development. 

Before the 2019-nCoV outbreak in December, CEPI had already developed partnerships with labs working on vaccines for MERS Coronavirus, a close cousin of 2019-nCoV. Therefore, a framework was already in place for fast-tracking the development of vaccines for the new outbreak. 

Another important factor in formulating a rapid response to 2019-nCoV has been the cooperation of countries involved in the epidemic response. Ward commented on the increased transparency of the Chinese government to release information about the new virus, including its genome sequence, very early on in the outbreak.  

“[China had an] ‘anti-precedence’ with SARS where [the Chinese government] held back information,” Ward said. “With Zika, there was considerable reticence on the part of the Brazilians to release strains. The Indonesian government has stated as a policy that […] you can be thrown in jail for trying to carry an influenza virus out of the country in anything but your lungs.” 

National laboratories are typically wary to provide information about novel pathogens because they have the potential to benefit from the sales of new pharmaceuticals and can immediately protect their citizens. Countries are thus economically and politically disincentivized from sharing specimens with others so long as they can control the outbreak. 

The 2019-nCoV outbreak has already killed over 300 people and is likely to kill many more before the infection can be contained. However, lessons learned from previous epidemics and recent advancements in science may help researchers overcome what could otherwise be a devastating pandemic, both in China and around the world.

Research Briefs, Science & Technology

Learning about our universe through bright bursts of light

by Thomas Bahen on

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On Jan. 6, McGill astronomers tracked down one of the brightest known repeating signals in the universe to a specific part of a galaxy just seven light years wide. The signal, called a Fast Radio Burst (FRB), was first detected in part by the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment (CHIME) telescope, a research collaboration between several McGill researchers and astrophysicists around the country.

FRBs interest astronomers because their origins and properties are not well understood. In astrophysical terms, brightness describes the apparent electromagnetic energy emission of some cosmic object when viewed from Earth. Essentially, this means that very bright signals correspond to high-energy events like stars going supernova. The event must be particularly high energy if it is coming from very far away. However, it is still unknown what event or events FRBs correspond to.

FRBs have an incredible amount of light energy packed into regions spanning only a few light years across. These bursts, which last less than five milliseconds, have surprised several astronomers. In fact, when the first one was discovered in 2007, there were doubts that it was even real.

Shriharsh Tendulkar, former postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Physics at McGill and a co-author of the FRB article published in the journal Nature, discussed the possible sources of FRBs and the many questions that these strange interstellar phenomena pose to researchers. 

Tendulkar first explained that FRBs are similar to pulsars, magnetized rotating neutron stars that similarly emit immense amounts of light radiation.

“FRBs are a trillion times more powerful [than pulsars],” Tendulkar wrote in an email to The McGill Tribune. “We have no idea how to physically make bursts that are this bright and this frequent.” 

By improving their understanding of FRBs, researchers seek to better postulate what kinds of cosmological objects emit them. So far, astronomers have categorized different types of FRBs into those that repeat and those that do not so that they can compare them and learn from their differences.

The next step after discovering an FRB is to localize it within a galaxy. Localization places the signal within an environment where only certain stars, gases, and other cosmological objects exist. The process allows astronomers to reason about what created the signal. Researchers have already localized a repeating FRB and several non-repeating FRBs to very different host environments.  A few non-repeating FRBs have been discovered in large elliptical galaxies where few young stars are being formed. In contrast, the first localized repeating FRB was found in a dwarf galaxy with an abundance of young stars. 

The FRB that CHIME discovered, however, was emanating from a completely new environment, different from those where previous FRB signals have been found. 

“We discovered [the FRB] to be in a large spiral galaxy, where there are young stars but the gas is not as pure as in a dwarf galaxy,” Tendulkar said. “This means that whatever is forming these FRBs should be able to form in a lot of different environments.” 

According to Tendulkar, the ability of FRBs to originate from diverse environments is just the beginning of what this newly documented radio burst can teach scientists about where electromagnetic energy comes from in space. The recently discovered FRB is the closest such signal to Earth and provides the opportunity for new avenues of research. Specifically, researchers can look more closely at the amount of energy released in the burst and electron and magnetic field distribution around the source. They could possibly even study corresponding bursts that travel at other frequencies, such as infrared radiation or X-rays. 

Tendulakr noted that the following months will be a crucial period in understanding FRBs. 

“We will be able to study [the FBR] in far greater detail than previously known,” Tendulkar said.  “We are now in the process of submitting many proposals to different telescopes to meticulously study this FRB and its environment.”

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