For the first time, astronomers have captured a remarkable image of a supermassive black hole in the heart of our Milky Way galaxy.
The eagerly awaited picture unveiled to the world today shows Sagittarius A * – which is approximately 4.3 million times the mass of our sun and is about 27,000 light-years from Earth.
Due to its distance from us, experts said it looked the same size in the sky as a donut on the moon.
This comes a little over three years after the same astronomers discovered the first image of its kind in a black hole.
The two black holes have striking similarities, despite the fact that Sagittarius A * is 2,000 times smaller than Messier 87, which is located in a distant galaxy 55 million light-years away.
In a long-awaited series of press conferences held simultaneously around the world, the team behind the Event Horizon telescope shared their findings after teasing the “revolutionary discovery of the Milky Way galaxy.”
While announcing the new image, Ferial Ozel of the University of Arizona called the black hole “the gentle giant at the center of our galaxy.”
It is also described as “the glue that holds the galaxy together.”
Black holes are areas of space where gravity is so intense that nothing can escape, including light.
Therefore, the released image does not depict the black hole itself, because it is completely dark, but the glowing gas that surrounds the phenomenon in a bright ring of bending light.
The ring is approximately the size of Mercury’s orbit around the sun, which is about 40 million miles (60 million km) in diameter.
For the first time, scientists have captured a remarkable image of a supermassive black hole in the heart of our Milky Way
The eagerly awaited picture unveiled to the world today shows Sagittarius A * – which is approximately 4.3 million times the mass of our sun and is about 27,000 light-years from Earth.
In a long-awaited series of press conferences held simultaneously around the world, the team behind the Event Horizon Telescope shared the findings of its observations, calling the moment a “revolutionary discovery of the Milky Way galaxy.”
This comes a little over three years after the same astronomers discovered the first-ever photograph of a black hole, Messier 87 (pictured left). Sagittarius A * is shown on the right as a comparison
WHAT IS A SAGITTARIUS A * AND HOW IS IT CATCHED ON CAMERA?
Sagittarius A * – short for Sgr A *, which is pronounced “sadge-ay-star” – owes its name to its discovery in the direction of the constellation Sagittarius.
Its existence has been suggested since 1974, with the discovery of an unusual radio source in the center of the galaxy.
In the 1990s, astronomers mapped the orbits of the brightest stars near the center of the Milky Way, confirming the existence of a supermassive compact object there, a work that led to the 2020 Nobel Prize in Physics.
Although the presence of a black hole was thought to be the only plausible explanation, the new image provided the first direct visual evidence.
Because it is 27,000 light-years from Earth, it looks the same size in the sky as a donut on the moon.
Imaging such a distant object requires connecting eight giant radio observatories around the planet to form a single Earth-sized virtual telescope called the EHT.
These include the 30-meter telescope of the Institute of Millimeter Radio Astronomy (IRAM) in Spain, the most sensitive single antenna in the EHT network.
EHT watched Sgr A * for several nights for many hours in a row – a similar idea to long-exposure photography and the same process used to create the first black hole image released in 2019.
This black hole is called M87 * because it is located in the galaxy Messier 87.
Astronomers said the discovery provided convincing evidence that the object was indeed a black hole, and provided valuable clues to the work of such giants, believed to be at the center of most galaxies.
Earlier, scientists saw stars orbiting something invisible, compact and very massive in the center of the Milky Way.
This strongly suggests that the object is a black hole, and today’s image provides the first direct visual proof of this.
Although it is not possible to see the black hole itself, as it is completely dark, the glowing gas around it reveals a telltale signature: a dark central area (called a shadow), surrounded by a bright ring structure.
The new view captures light bent by the powerful gravity of the black hole.
“We were stunned by how well the size of the ring matched the predictions of Einstein’s general theory of relativity,” said EHT scientist Jeffrey Bauer of the Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Academia Sinica, Taipei.
“These unprecedented observations have greatly improved our understanding of what is happening at the very center of our galaxy, and offer new insights into how these giant black holes interact with their surroundings.”
The results of the EHT team are published today in a special issue of The Astrophysical Journal Letters.
Dr Younsi, an associate of Stephen Hawking of UKRI at UCL’s Mullard Space Science Laboratory, said: “Our results are the strongest evidence so far that a black hole is at the heart of our galaxy.
“This black hole is the glue that holds the galaxy together. This is key to our understanding of how the Milky Way formed and will evolve in the future.
“The creation of this image is the result of the monumental efforts of hundreds of scientists over five years.
“This was a particular challenge due to the fog of stars, dust and gas between the Earth and the galactic center, as well as the fact that the pattern of light from Sgr A * changes quickly, within minutes.
“But now we have comprehensive findings, and this work opens a new chapter in our understanding of black holes.”
In April 2019, astronomers revealed that they had captured an image of a black hole 310 million trillion miles (500 million trillion km) in a galaxy called M87.
Messier 87 was described by scientists at the time as a “monster”, measuring about 24 billion miles (40 billion km) in diameter – three million times the size of Earth.
This was also depicted by the Event Horizon Telescope, a network of eight connected telescopes showing a luminous ring of red, yellow and white surrounding a dark center.
The eight telescopes collected 5 petabytes of data – either “the equivalent of 5,000 years of mp3s” or “the life of a selfie for 40,000 people.”
Astronomers say the discovery provides indisputable evidence that the Sagittarius A * object is indeed a black hole and provides valuable clues to the work of such giants, believed to be at the center of most galaxies.
The black hole is depicted by the Event Horizon Telescope (pictured), a network of eight connected telescopes
This artist’s impression shows the anatomy of a black hole, including its event horizon, singularity and accretion disk
WHAT IS THE HORIZON OF EVENTS?
The event horizon is a theoretical boundary around a black hole where light or other radiation cannot escape.
When any of this material gets too close to the edge of the hole, known as the event horizon, its atoms break.
The nuclei disappear below the horizon, much lighter electrons are trapped in the intense magnetic field of the black hole and thrown around at high speed.
This twisting motion causes them to release photons, which are the main source of radiation from matter near the black hole.
The observations from the Event Horizon Telescope can now be considered one of the most significant scientific discoveries of the century.
In addition to looking the same, Sgr A * and M87 behave as predicted by Einstein’s 1915 theory of general relativity, which states that the force of gravity is the result of the curvature of space and time, and that space objects change this geometry.
Despite the fact that Sgr A * is much closer to us, astronomers have said that depicting it poses unique challenges.
The gas near the two black holes moves at the same speed, close to the speed of light. But although it took days and weeks to orbit the larger M87 *, he completed the Sgr A * in just minutes.
The brightness and pattern of the gas around the Sgr A * changed quickly as the team observed it, “a bit like trying to take a clear picture of a puppy quickly chasing its tail,” said EHT scientist Chi-Kwan Chan of the University of Arizona. .
Researchers had to develop sophisticated new tools for tracking moving targets.
The resulting image – the work of more than 300 researchers from 80 countries over a five-year period – represents an average of many images that reveal the invisible monster lurking in the center of the galaxy.
Scientists are now eager to compare the two black holes to test theories about how gases behave around them – a poorly understood phenomenon believed to play a role in the formation of new stars and galaxies.
The study of black holes – especially their infinitesimally small and dense centers, known as singularities, where Einstein’s equations decay – can help physicists deepen their understanding of gravity and develop more advanced theories.
Black holes are extremely dense objects with such strong gravity that even light cannot escape, which makes looking at them quite challenging.
The event horizon of a black hole is the point of no return, beyond which everything – stars, planets, gas, dust and all forms of electromagnetic radiation – is forgotten.
The international collaboration that makes up the Event Horizon Telescope’s efforts includes observatories at the South Pole, Europe, South America, Africa, North America and Australia – all of which must be directed directly to the site to measure the surrounding activity.
The project began in 2012 to try to directly monitor the immediate environment of a black hole.
In 2019, scientists lifted the veil on the first photos ever taken in black …
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