Scientists have used artificial intelligence to construct a three-dimensional model of an energetic outburst, or flare, that occurred around the Milky Way’s central black hole, Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*). This 3D model could help scientists develop a clearer picture of the tumultuous environment that forms around supermassive black holes in general. The material swirling around […]
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Class of 1958 Career Development Assistant Professor Erin Kara of the Department of Physics has been named as the recipient of the 2023-24 Harold E. Edgerton Faculty Achievement Award. Established in 1982, the award is a tribute to the late Institute Professor Emeritus Harold E. Edgerton for his support for younger faculty members. This award recognizes […]
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Astronomers have imaged a feeding black hole-powered quasar at the very edge of the universe, so far away that it was seen as it appeared less than 1 billion years after the Big Bang. The quasar, designated SDSS J114816.64+525150.3, is powered by a supermassive black hole over 3 billion times the mass of the sun […]
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The Milky Way has a big newfound black hole, and it lurks close to Earth! This sleeping giant was discovered with the European space telescope Gaia, which tracks the motion of billions of stars in our galaxy. Stellar-mass black holes are created when a large star runs out of fuel and collapses. The new discovery […]
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Black holes are monstrous and monolithic regions of space and time that have captured humanity’s imagination. Some are created by the death and collapse of a massive star — yet no single star can birth the most tremendously large black holes. Those are the supermassive black holes that lurk at the hearts of galaxies with […]
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When it comes to primordial black holes being dark matter suspects, their alibi may be falling apart. Tiny black holes, created seconds after the birth of the universe, may survive longer than expected, reigniting a suspicion that primordial black holes could account for dark matter, the universe’s most mysterious stuff. Dark matter currently represents one […]
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As Netta Engelhardt sees it, secrets never die. Not even in a black hole. Engelhardt is a theoretical physicist at MIT who is teasing out the convoluted physics in and around black holes, in search of the fundamental ingredients that shape our universe. In the process, she’s upending popular ideas in the fields of quantum […]
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A new investigation into a rare and short-lived type of galaxy has revealed that such objects harbor slumbering supermassive black holes that briefly awaken to rip apart a massive star and devour its remains as a giant cosmic breakfast. “Compact Symmetric Objects,” or CSOs, are active galaxies that have two jets blasting out from them […]
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At the heart of a far-off galaxy, a supermassive black hole appears to have had a case of the hiccups. Astronomers from MIT, Italy, the Czech Republic, and elsewhere have found that a previously quiet black hole, which sits at the center of a galaxy about 800 million light-years away, has suddenly erupted, giving off […]
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