supermassive black holes tagged posts

Supermassive black holes are among the most enigmatic objects in the universe. They typically weigh millions or even billions of times the mass of the sun and sit at the centers of most large galaxies. At the heart of the Milky Way lies Sagittarius A*, our galaxy’s supermassive blackhole, with a mass of about four million suns. But these black holes do not emit light, so astronomers can only detect them indirectly through their effects on nearby stars and gas. Artist’s depiction of a supermassive black hole tearing apart a star, with roughly half of the stellar debris flung back into space while the remainder forms a glowing accretion disk around the black hole. Credit: DESY, Science Communication Lab

In a study published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, Eric Coughlin, assista...

Supermassive black holes at the centers of galaxies are one of the most active fields of research in astronomy. In order to accumulate their enormous masses, they must merge with each other. A research team led by Silke Britzen from the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy (MPIfR) in Bonn has found direct evidence of two supermassive black holes in the galaxy Markarian 501, which orbit each other very closely. This could be the first time that a pair has been detected that is about to merge. This provides a unique opportunity to better understand a central process in galaxy evolution.

The findings suggest that there is a supermassive black hole at the center of almost every large galaxy, with a mass millions or even billions of times greater than that of our sun...

Giant black holes may be secretly controlling how entire clusters of galaxies grow. A blazing supermassive black hole can influence far more than its own galaxy. Scientists found that quasars emit radiation strong enough to shut down star formation in nearby galaxies millions of light-years away. This could explain why some galaxies near early quasars appear faint or missing. The finding suggests galaxies grow and evolve together, not in isolation.

Powerful radiation from active supermassive black holes, which are believed to sit at the center of most galaxies, can do more than shape their own surroundings. A new study led by Yongda Zhu at the University of Arizona suggests these black holes can also slow the formation of stars in galaxies located millions of light-years away.

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According to a new Physical Review Letters study, black holes could help solve the dark matter mystery. The shadowy regions in black hole images captured by the Event Horizon Telescope can act as ultra-sensitive detectors for the invisible material that makes up most of the universe’s matter.

Dark matter makes up roughly 85% of the universe’s matter, but scientists still don’t know what it actually is. While researchers have proposed countless ways to detect it, this study introduces black hole imaging as a fresh detection method—one that comes with some distinct benefits.

The...