Perth. When the most massive stars die, they collapse to form a black hole, one of the densest objects known in the universe. These are the “deepest” objects in the universe, so deep that not even light can escape their incredibly strong gravity.
Because of this, it is impossible to directly photograph black holes, making them mysterious and quite surprising. But our new research has put a test to the discovery of some of the most terrifying black holes, making it easier to find these black holes buried deep in the hearts of distant galaxies.
The name may be black, but not all black holes are black. While black holes are of many different sizes, the largest are at the center of galaxies, and are still increasing in size. The mass of these “massive” black holes can be up to a billion Suns. The black hole at the center of our own galaxy – called Cegitarius A*, the discovery of which won the 2020 Nobel Prize in Physics – is quite quiet. But this is not the case with all supermassive black holes.
If matter like gas, dust or stars gets too close to the black hole, then the black hole pulls them towards itself by the enormous gravitational force. As it falls towards the black hole, it heats up and becomes incredibly bright. The light emanating from these “bright black holes” can spread throughout the electromagnetic field, from X-rays to radio waves.
Another name for these bright black holes located in the center of galaxies is “active galactic nuclei”, or AGN. They can be trillions of times brighter than the Sun, and sometimes even brighter than all the stars in their own galaxy.
brightest black hole
Some AGNs violently spew matter with a jolt, which travels millions of kilometers into space and can be seen by radio telescopes. Others generate “winds” at the center of the galaxy, which are capable of pushing any gas (the fuel needed to form stars) out of the galaxy.
With such destructive forces in the middle of the Milky Way, astronomers are sure it will have a major impact on the Milky Way itself. We know that most galaxies are slowly ceasing their star formation processes, and an AGN may be one of the reasons. So AGN can not only help us better understand elusive black holes, but studying them also tells us about the galaxies themselves.
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