Black Holes Archives

January 13, 2024January 13, 2024 by Carolyn Collins Petersen

Black Holes and Neutron Stars are Finally Linked to Supernovae

A star in a binary system dies in a catastrophic explosion. Such supernovae often result in neutron stars or black holes. Courtesy ESO/L. Calçada — This artist’s impression is based on the aftermath of a supernova explosion as seen by two teams of astronomers with both ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) and ESO’s New Technology Telescope (NTT). The supernova observed, SN 2022jli, occurred when a massive star died in a fiery explosion, leaving behind a compact object — a neutron star or a black hole. This dying star, however, had a companion which was able to survive this violent event. The periodic interactions between the compact object and its companion left periodic signals in the data, which revealed that the supernova explosion had indeed resulted in a compact object.

Everybody knows that the explosive deaths of supermassive stars (called supernovae) lead to the creation of black holes or neutron stars, right? At least, that’s the evolutionary path that astronomers suggest happens. And, these compact objects exist throughout the Universe. But, no one’s ever seen the actual birth process of a neutron star or black hole in action before.

December 9, 2023December 9, 2023 by Mark Thompson

What Could a Next Generation Event Horizon Telescope Do?

Image of the M87 black hole by EHT and a CGI image photon ring. Image credit: EHT, Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian

Telescopes have come a long way in a little over four hundred years! It was 1608 that Dutch spectacle maker Hans Lippershey who was said to be working with a case of myopia and, in working with lenses discovered the magnifying powers if arranged in certain configurations. Now, centuries on and we have many different telescope designs and even telescopes in orbit but none are more incredible than the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT). Images las year revealed the supermassive black hole at the centre of our Galaxy and around M87 but now a team of astronomers have explored the potential of an even more powerful system the Next Generation EHT (ngEHT).

November 25, 2023November 25, 2023 by Brian Koberlein

Dark Matter Could Help Solve the Final Parsec Problem of Black Holes

A simulation of two merging black holes. Credit: Simulating eXtreme Spacetimes (SXS) Project

When galaxies collide, their supermassive black holes enter into a gravitational dance, gradually orbiting each other ever closer until eventually…merging. We know they merge because we see the gravitational beasts that result, and we have detected the gravitational waves they emit as they inspiral. But the details of their final consummation remain a mystery. Now a new paper suggests part of that mystery can be solved with a bit of dark matter.

November 24, 2023November 24, 2023 by Evan Gough

Vera Rubin Will Find Binary Supermassive Black Holes. Here’s How.

When galaxies merge, we expect them to produce binary black holes (BBHs.) BBHs orbit one another closely, and when they merge, they produce gravitational waves that have been detected by LIGO-Virgo. The upcoming Vera Rubin Observatory should be able to find them before they merge, which would open a whole new window into the study of galaxy mergers, supermassive black holes, binary black holes, and gravitational waves.

November 17, 2023November 17, 2023 by Evan Gough

Can a Dead Star Keep Exploding?

This is an artist’s representation of AT2022tsd, an explosion in a distant galaxy. The image shows one possible explanation for the strange object. It could be a black hole accreting matter from a disk and powering a jet. Variation in the jet's direction could produce the observed rapid flashes. Image Credit: Robert L. Hurt/Caltech/IPAC

In September 2022, an automated sky survey detected what seemed to be a supernova explosion about one billion light-years away. The Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) spotted it and gave it the name AT2022tsd. But something was different about this supernova. Supernovae explode and shine brightly for months, while AT2022tsd exploded brightly and then faded within days.

November 15, 2023November 9, 2023 by Paul M. Sutter

How Black Holes Consume Entropy

Artist view of orbiting black holes. Credit: Caltech/R. Hurt (IPAC)

Entropy is one of those fearsomely deep concepts that form the core of entire fields of physics (in this case, thermodynamics) that is unfortunately so mathematical that it’s difficult to explain in plain language. But we will give it a try. Whenever I see the word entropy, I like to replace it with the phrase “counting the number of ways that I can rearrange a scenario while leaving it largely the same.” That’s a bit of a mouthful, I agree, and so entropy will have to do.

November 15, 2023November 9, 2023 by Paul M. Sutter

The Origins of the Black Hole Information Paradox

Artist's impression of an ultramassive black hole (UBH). Credit: ESA/Hubble/DSS/Nick Risinger/N. Bartmann

While physics tells us that information can neither be created nor destroyed (if information could be created or destroyed, then the entire raison d’etre of physics, that is to predict future events or identify the causes of existing situations, would be impossible), it does not demand that the information be accessible. For decades physicists assumed that the information that fell into a black hole is still there, still existing, just locked away from view.

November 14, 2023November 9, 2023 by Paul M. Sutter

The Maddening Simplicity of Black Holes

Black holes.

The name is said to come from the Black Hole of Calcutta, an infamous prison that you cannot escape from. It is a fitting name, for black holes are the ultimate cosmological prison.

November 13, 2023November 13, 2023 by Carolyn Collins Petersen

Growing Black Hole Seen Only 470 Million Years After the Big Bang

A composite Chandra and JWST image of a quasar whose light shone through an intervening galaxy cluster. The black hole at the heart of the quasar formed some 470 million years after the Big Bang. Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO/Ákos Bogdán; Infrared: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI; Image Processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/L. Frattare & K. Arcand

One of the big questions in cosmology asks when black holes first showed up in the early Universe. Recently astronomers discovered the most distant (and therefore earliest) supermassive black hole ever seen. It appears as it did when the Universe was only 470 million years old.

November 10, 2023November 10, 2023 by Brian Koberlein

If We Could Find Them, Primordial Black Holes Would Explain a Lot About the Universe

Artist view of small black holes in the accretion disk of a supermassive black hole. Credit: Caltech/R. Hurt (IPAC)

There are three known types of black holes in the Universe: supermassive black holes that lurk in the centers of galaxies, stellar-mass black holes that are the remnants of massive stars, and intermediate-mass black holes that can be found in dense clusters of stars. But there is a fourth, hypothetical type of black hole known as primordial black holes (PBHs). If they exist, they could solve a few cosmological mysteries.