Black Holes Archives

December 23, 2024December 23, 2024 by Brian Koberlein

How Did Black Holes Grow So Quickly? The Jets

Artist’s impression of a bright, very early active galactic nucleus. Credit: NSF/AUI/NSF NRAO/B. Saxton

Within nearly every galaxy is a supermassive black hole. The beast at the heart of our galaxy contains the mass of millions of suns, while some of the largest supermassive black holes can be more than a billion solar masses. For years, it was thought that these black holes grew in mass over time, only reaching their current size after a billion years or more. But observations from the Webb telescope show that even the youngest galaxies contain massive black holes. So how could supermassive black holes grow so large so quickly? The key to the answer could be the powerful jets black holes can produce.

December 22, 2024December 17, 2024 by Paul M. Sutter

Quantum Correlations Could Solve the Black Hole Information Paradox

Artist view of a black hole ringing down into a stable state. Credit: Yasmine Steele at University of Illinois – Urbana Champaign

The black hole information paradox has puzzled physicists for decades. New research shows how quantum connections in spacetime itself may resolve the paradox, and in the process leave behind a subtle signature in gravitational waves.

December 22, 2024December 22, 2024 by Matt Williams

M87 Releases a Rare and Powerful Outburts of Gamma-ray Radiation

A Hubble Space Telescope image of the giant galaxy M87 shows a 3,000-light-year-long jet of plasma blasting from the galaxy's 6.5-billion-solar-mass central black hole. The blowtorch-like jet seems to cause stars to erupt along its trajectory. These novae are not caught inside the jet, but are apparently in a dangerous neighbourhood nearby. During a recent 9-month survey, astronomers using Hubble found twice as many of these novae going off near the jet as elsewhere in the galaxy. The galaxy is the home of several trillion stars and thousands of star-like globular star clusters. [Image description: A Hubble photo of galaxy M87, which resembles a translucent, fuzzy white cotton ball. The brightness decreases gradually out in all directions from a bright white point of light at the centre. A wavy blue-white jet of material extends from the point-like core outward to the upper right, about halfway across the galaxy. Stars speckle the background.]

In April 2019, the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) collaboration made history when it released the first-ever image of a black hole. The image captured the glow of the accretion disk surrounding the supermassive black hole (SMBH) at the center of the M87 galaxy, located 54 million light-years away. Because of its appearance, the disk that encircles this SMBH beyond its event horizon (composed of gas, dust, and photons) was likened to a “ring of fire.” Since then, the EHT has been actively imaging several other SMBH, including Sagittarius A* at the center of the Milky Way!

In addition, the EHT has revealed additional details about M87, like the first-ever image of a photon ring and a picture that combines the SMBH and its relativistic jet emanating from its center. Most recently, the EHT released the results of its latest observation campaign. These observations revealed a spectacular flare emerging from M87’s powerful relativistic jet. This flare released a tremendous amount of energy in multiple wavelengths, including the first high-energy gamma-ray outburst observed in over a decade.

December 20, 2024December 20, 2024 by Mark Thompson

Star Devouring Black Hole Spotted by Astronomers

Recreation of a burst, identified as CSS161010, in which a small black hole swallows a star. Credits: Gabriel Pérez (IAC)

A team of astronomers have detected a surprisingly fast and bright burst of energy from a galaxy 500 million light years away. The burst of radiation peaked in brightness just after 4 day and then faded quickly. The team identified the burst, which was using the Catalina Real-Time Transient Survey with supporting observations from the Gran Telescopio Canarias, as the result of a small black hole consuming a star. The discovery provides an exciting insight into stellar evolution and a rare cosmic phenomenon.

December 19, 2024December 19, 2024 by Brian Koberlein

Building the Black Hole Family Tree

Illustration of how black hole mergers might reveal their ancestors. Credit: Instituto Galego de Física de Altas Enerxías, IGFAE

In 2019, astronomers observed an unusual gravitational chirp. Known as GW190521, it was the last scream of gravitational waves as a black hole of 66 solar masses merged with a black hole of 85 solar masses to become a 142 solar mass black hole. The data were consistent with all the other black hole mergers we’ve observed. There was just one problem: an 85 solar mass black hole shouldn’t exist.

December 11, 2024December 11, 2024 by Mark Thompson

Zap! A Black Hole Scores a Direct Hit With its Jet

NASA/CXC/SAO/D. Bogensberger et al; Image Processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/N. Wolk;

Most galaxies are thought to play host to black holes. At the center of Centaurus A, a galaxy 12 million light years away, a jet is being fired out into space. Images that have been captured by NASA’s Chandra X-ray observatory show that the high energy particles have struck a nearby object creating a shockwave. The target is thought to be a giant star, maybe even a binary system, where the collision and turbulence has increased density in the region.

December 3, 2024December 3, 2024 by Evan Gough

Could Primordial Black Holes Be Hiding in Plain Sight?

An artistic take on primordial black holes. Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center

Are Primordial Black Holes real? They could’ve formed in the unusual physics that dominated the Universe shortly after the Big Bang. The idea dates back to the 1960s, but so far, the lack of evidence makes them purely hypothetical.

If they do exist, a new paper suggests they may be hiding in places so unlikely that nobody ever thought to look there.

November 21, 2024November 21, 2024 by Matt Williams

New Study Suggests Black Holes Get their “Hair” from their Mothers

This artist’s impression of a supermassive black hole and accretion disk, along with a relativistic jet emanating from its poles. Credit & ©: ESO/L. Calçada

Despite decades of study, black holes are still one of the most puzzling objects in the Universe. As we know from Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity, the gravitational force of these stellar remnants alters the curvature of spacetime around them. This causes gas, dust, and even photons (light) in their vicinity to fall inwards and form disks that slowly accrete onto their faces, never to be seen again. However, astronomers have also noted that they can produce powerful jets that accelerate charged particles to close to the speed of light (aka. relativistic jets).

These jets lead to powerful gamma-ray bursts (GRBs), which have been observed with black holes that have powerful magnetic fields. However, where these magnetic fields come from has remained a mystery to astrophysicists for some time. According to new research led by scientists from the Flatiron Institute, the source of these fields may have finally been revealed. Based on a series of simulations they conducted that modeled the life cycle of stars from birth to collapse, they found that black holes inherit their magnetic fields from the parent stars themselves.

November 20, 2024November 14, 2024 by Paul M. Sutter

Sun-Like Stars Around Black Holes: What Gives?

Illustration of star remnants after it is shredded by a supermassive black hole. Credit: NASA

Buried in the treasure trove of the Gaia catalog were two strange black hole systems. These were black holes orbiting sun-like stars, a situation that astronomers long thought impossible. Recently a team has proposed a mechanism for creating these kinds of oddballs.

November 19, 2024November 14, 2024 by Paul M. Sutter

The Biggest Black Holes May Start From The Tiniest Seeds

An artist's conception of jets protruding from a quasar. Credit: ESO/M. Kornmesser

The existence of gigantic black holes in the very early universe challenges our assumptions of how black holes form and grow. New research suggests that these monsters may have found their origins in the earliest epochs of the Big Bang.