Tag Archive for 'Black hole'

This graphic shows X-rays that NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory detected from the dwarf galaxy Mrk 462. This X-ray emission (inset) is important because it reveals the presence of a growing supermassive black hole within this relatively small galaxy. The mass contained in this black hole -- about 200,000 times the mass of the Sun -- provides information to astronomers about how some of the earliest black holes in the Universe may have formed and grown billions of years ago. The background panel is an optical image from the Pan-STARRS telescope in Hawaii. There are several galaxies that are part of the HCG068 galaxy group on the left-hand side of the image. The galaxy that is emitting copious amounts of X-rays, however, is the much smaller galaxy located to the lower right of the image (marked by the arrow). Image credit: NASA / CXC / Dartmouth College / J. Parker & R. Hickox / Pan-STARRS.

Chandra Detects Mini-Supermassive Black Hole in Star-Forming Dwarf Galaxy

Jan 11, 2022 by News Staff

A supermassive black hole with 200,000 solar masses is located in the middle of the dwarf galaxy Markarian 462 (Mrk 462), according to new research led...

An artist’s rendition of a giant star in orbit around a low-mass black hole. Image credit: Sci-News.com.

Black Holes are Giant Fuzzballs, Theoretical Physicists Say

Jan 5, 2022 by News Staff

In 1997, cosmologists Stephen Hawking, Kip Thorne and John Preskill made a famous bet as to whether information that enters a black hole ceases to exist....

Four enormous cavities have been found at the center of the RBS 797 galaxy cluster using Chandra. Image credit: NASA / CXC / University of Bologna / F. Ubertosi / STScl / M. Calzadilla / NSF / NRAO / ALMA.

Chandra Spots Four Cavities in Center of Galaxy Cluster

Dec 29, 2021 by News Staff

Astronomers using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory have found a quartet of pronounced X-ray cavities in RBS 797, a cluster of galaxies located about...

This MWA image shows Centaurus A at radio wavelengths, revealing vast lobes of plasma that reach far beyond the visible galaxy, which occupies only a small patch at the center of the image. The dots in the background are not stars, but radio galaxies much like Centaurus A, at far greater distances. Image credit: Ben McKinley, ICRAR & Curtin University / Connor Matherne, Louisiana State University.

Radio Astronomers Spot Bipolar Outflow from Centaurus A’s Supermassive Black Hole

Dec 23, 2021 by News Staff

Centaurus A (NGC 5128) is a giant elliptical galaxy 12 million light-years away in the constellation of Centaurus. In its center lies an actively feeding...

In this illustration of the center of the Milky Way, stars are seen to be in close orbit around Sagittarius A*. Image credit: Gemini Observatory / NOIRLab / NSF / AURA / J. da Silva, Spaceengine / M. Zamani, NOIRLab.

Astrophysicists Make Most Precise Measurement Yet of Milky Way’s Central Black Hole Mass

Dec 15, 2021 by News Staff

Sagittarius A*, supermassive black hole at the center of our Milky Way Galaxy, has a mass of 4.3 million times that of the Sun, according to an analysis...

This is a composite view of X-rays, molecular gas, and warm ionized gas near the Milky Way’s center (yellow represents Hubble data, blue is Chandra data, green is ALMA data, and red is VLA data). The orange-colored features are of glowing hydrogen gas. One such feature, at the top tip of the jet is interpreted as a hydrogen cloud that has been hit by the outflowing jet. The jet scatters off the cloud into tendrils that flow northward. Farther down near the black hole are X-ray observations of superheated gas colored blue and molecular gas in green. These data are evidence that the black hole occasionally accretes stars or gas clouds, and ejects some of the superheated material along its spin axis. The graphic of a translucent, vertical white fan is added to show the suggested axis of a mini-jet from the supermassive black hole at the Galaxy’s heart. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Gerald Cecil, University of North Carolina / Joseph DePasquale, STScI.

Astronomers Spot Nuclear Jet near Milky Way’s Supermassive Black Hole

Dec 10, 2021 by News Staff

Astronomers have uncovered evidence that Sagittarius A*, the 4-million-solar-mass black hole at the center of our Milky Way Galaxy, is not a sleeping monster...

VLA image of the Messier 87 radio jet, made at multiple radio frequencies. The jet seen in this image is about 8,000 light-years long. This image clearly shows the corkscrew-like helical structure in the inner part of the jet, which originates at the bright spot at the left, at the core of the galaxy, where a supermassive black hole resides. Image credit: Sophia Dagnello / NRAO / AUI / NSF / Pasetto et al., doi: 10.3847/2041-8213/ac3a88.

Astronomers Spot Double-Helix Structure in Messier 87

Dec 8, 2021 by News Staff

Astronomers using NSF’s Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array have captured unprecedented high-fidelity radio images of a jet of material propelled from the...

The dwarf spheroidal galaxy Leo I is 30 times smaller than the Milky Way Galaxy. Image credit: ESA / Gaia / DPAC / SDSS.

Dwarf Galaxy Leo I Hosts Strangely Massive Black Hole, Astronomers Say

Dec 2, 2021 by News Staff

A black hole in the center of a dwarf spheroidal galaxy called Leo I is almost as massive as the central black hole of our own Milky Way Galaxy. The dwarf...

Photons emitted near rotating black holes encode quantum information that can be measured by actual quantum information technology. Image credit: Sci-News.com.

Astrophysicists Search for Gravitational-Wave Signals from Ultralight Boson Clouds

Dec 1, 2021 by News Staff

Theories of beyond Standard Model physics allow for the production of ultralight bosons — hypothetical particles with masses less than a billionth...

This image, taken with the MUSE instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope, shows two bright galactic nuclei, each housing a supermassive black hole, in NGC 7727. Image credit: ESO / Voggel et al.

Astronomers Find Two Supermassive Black Holes in NGC 7727

Dec 1, 2021 by Enrico de Lazaro

The supermassive black hole pair, located in the peculiar galaxy NGC 7727, is about 89 million light-years away from Earth, making it the record holder...

This artist’s impression shows NGC 1850 BH1 and a massive star orbiting it. The distortion of the star’s shape is due to the strong gravitational force exerted by the black hole. Image credit: M. Kornmesser / ESO.

Astronomers Detect Stellar-Mass Black Hole in Large Magellanic Cloud

Nov 12, 2021 by Natali Anderson

Astronomers using the Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE) instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope have discovered a low-mass black hole in the...

Graphical table of all gravitational wave events discovered from 2015 through the end of LIGO/Virgo’s third observing run. The table includes the gravitational event name, the type of binary component (black hole, neutron star, or uncertain), the masses of the primary and secondary, and the mass of the final merged object. Image credit: LIGO / Virgo / KAGRA / C. Knox / H. Middleton.

Astrophysicists Detect 35 New Gravitational-Wave Events

Nov 10, 2021 by News Staff

Astrophysicists from the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA Collaboration have detected a further 35 gravitational waves since the last catalog release in October 2020,...

A view of the accretion disk around the supermassive black hole, with jet-like structures flowing away from the disk. The extreme mass of the black hole bends spacetime, allowing the far side of the accretion disc to be seen as an image above and below the black hole. Image credit: Science Communication Lab, DESY.

Black Holes Grow along with Universe’s Expansion, Study Suggests

Nov 4, 2021 by News Staff

Since the first observation of merging black holes in 2015, astrophysicists have been repeatedly surprised by their large masses. They originally expected...

An artist’s impression of the binary system MAXI J1820+070. Image credit: John Paice.

Warped Accretion Disk Spotted around Stellar-Mass Black Hole

Oct 28, 2021 by News Staff

Variations in the brightness of light seen from around a stellar-mass black hole in the binary system MAXI J1820+070 were caused by a huge warp in its...

Astronomers Measure Mass and Spin of Intermediate-Mass Black Hole

Sep 17, 2021 by News Staff

The intermediate-mass black hole in question was caught in the act of swallowing a star, called a tidal disruption event. Dubbed 3XMM J215022.4-055108,...

Clumps of molecular gas overlaid on Sagittarius A* circumnuclear disk as seen by ALMA in the CS(7-6) line. Yellow circles are thin clumps that are going to be shredded by the gravitational force of supermassive black hole Sagittarius A*. Green circles are dense enough to survive the tidal shredding but are not able to form stars. Purple/pink circles have the needed density to form stars, but no star formation has been observed. Image credit: Hsieh et al. / ALMA / EOS / NAOJ / NRAO.

ALMA Spots Quiescent Molecular Clouds and Tides around Milky Way’s Supermassive Black Hole

Sep 16, 2021 by News Staff

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have found thousands of dense gas clumps but, surprisingly, no star formation,...

Siraj & Loeb explore the possibility that accretion flares resulting from the tidal disruption of small Oort Cloud bodies by a putative primordial black hole could power an observable optical signal that could be searched for with the upcoming Vera C. Rubin Observatory Legacy Survey of Space and Time. Image credit: Sci-News.com / Zdeněk Bardon / ESO.

Static Black Holes Exert Pressure on Their Environment, Scientists Say

Sep 13, 2021 by News Staff

In 1974, Stephen Hawking made the seminal discovery that black holes emit thermal radiation. Previous to that, black holes were believed to be inert. In...

Fast-moving debris from a supernova explosion triggered by a stellar collision in the VT 1210+4956 system crashes into material thrown out earlier, and the shocks cause bright radio emission seen by the VLA. Image credit: Bill Saxton / NRAO / AUI / NSF.

Compact Object Collision with Companion Star Triggers Supernova Event

Sep 2, 2021 by News Staff

Using data collected by the Very Large Array Sky Survey (VLASS), astronomers have found evidence that a compact object — a black hole or neutron...

MG B2016+112: the X-ray light from one of the objects on the left (purple) has been warped by the gravity of the intervening galaxy to produce two beams and X-ray sources (A and B) detected in the Chandra image, which is represented by the dashed square on the right; the X-ray light from the fainter object (blue) produces an X-ray source (C) that has been amplified by the galaxy to be as much as 300 times brighter than it would have been without the lensing; the Chandra image is shown in the inset; these two X-ray-emitting objects are likely a pair of growing supermassive black holes or a growing supermassive black hole and a jet. Image credit: NASA / CXC / M. Weiss / SAO / Schwartz et al.

Chandra Observes Gravitationally-Lensed Supermassive Black Hole System

Sep 1, 2021 by News Staff

By combining gravitational lensing with the capabilities of NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, astronomers have detected two X-ray-emitting objects —...

Dacheng Lin et al discovered a ‘wandering’ black hole in the lenticular galaxy GJ1417+52. The main panel has a wide-field, optical light image from Hubble. The black hole and its host galaxy are located within the box in the upper left. The inset on the left contains Hubble’s close-up view of GJ1417+52. Within this inset the circle shows a point-like source on the northern outskirts of the galaxy that may be associated with XJ1417+52. The inset on the right is Chandra’s X-ray image of XJ1417+52 in purple, covering the same region as the Hubble close-up. Image credit: X-ray – NASA / CXC / UNH / Dacheng Lin et al; optical – NASA / STScI.

Wandering Supermassive Black Holes May Be More Abundant than Previously Thought

Aug 23, 2021 by News Staff

New research led by astronomers from the Harvard & Smithsonian’s Center for Astrophysics shows that the current census of supermassive black holes...

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