Astrophysicists at the European Southern Observatory have just announced a conference where they will present a mysterious discovery presented as “revolutionary” regarding the Milky Way.
A team of renowned astronomers has just thrilled the community of all space professionals and hobbyists by teasing the announcement of a “revolutionary” discovery in our Milky Way galaxy. These results will be announced on May 12th and the least we can say is that there is a lot of interest.
In fact, this surprisingly mysterious and loud announcement would have been an anecdote had it come out of a lambda lab. But it’s actually the exact opposite; The press release comes directly from the prestigious European Southern Observatory (ESO)an attitude that clearly doesn’t fall for excitement.
It mainly has to do with the results related to:Event Horizon Telescope (EHT)† In this regard, just mentioning an important finding is enough to make astronomers shudder. And rightly so: it is the same machine that made it possible to produce the same thing The world’s first direct image of a black hole. A big step for professionals, but also for the general public who was fascinated by this red aura full of traces.
The main task of the EHT team has been: Exploring the heart of our galaxy† It is therefore to be expected that the discovery”revolutionary“The announcement by ESO is directly related to this area. For now, the tension remains the same; but whatever the researchers find there, they think it’s worth announcing it with great fanfare at a special conference on May 12.
A link with Sagittarius A*?
In the meantime, we can try to formulate some hypotheses. To do this, we can begin to look at the characteristics of this area. It is generally accepted that the Milky Way, like many other galaxies, is centered around a Black hole super heavy called bow A* (Sgr A*).
However, as mentioned above, the EHT has been pointing in that direction for several months now. If one adds this information to his ancestry as a black hole hunter, he begins to outline a viable scenario; It seems increasingly likely that ESO is on the cusp of announcing a major discovery about the nature and properties of Sagittarius A*.
Because even though it is generally believed to be a black hole, this information has not been verified with absolute certainty. The most decisive results came from the extraordinary work of Reinhard Genzel and Andrea Geis. They managed to prove that Sgr A* is an extremely massive object represented by a black hole The only reasonable explanation Among current models.
Since this award-winning work Nobel Prize in Physics For the authors in 2020, the scientific community is working hard to definitively confirm the state of the black hole. Above all, they are trying to produce an image of the black hole’s horizon in the visible spectrum, as in 2019.
Searching for black holes, a complex exercise
This was indeed a resounding scientific achievement. In fact, black holes are by definition Not very impressive. meThey have a nasty habit of absorbing all electromagnetic radiation, including light. It is therefore physically impossible to observe the black hole itself.
Astronomers have to content themselves with looking for the horizon, a frontier embodied by A The disk of gas and dust that accumulates around the singularity While they emit very intense radiation. For this reason, the image of a black hole passed down to future generations is shaped like a ring.
This is when the first image of a black hole was processed, said researcher Katie Bowman. #EHTBlackHole #blackhole_day # Black hole (Fifth/Embed Tweet) pic.twitter.com/n0ZnIoeG1d
-MIT CSAIL (MIT_CSAIL) 10 april 2019
The photo was announced on Sgr A* more complicated† In fact, this cosmic giant has so far only been observed indirectly, thanks to the mass and orbits of nearby objects. If it’s hard to spot right away, it’s because it’s partially obscured by a Huge cloud of dust and gas† An obstacle that greatly complicates the task of astronomers. If they had indeed succeeded in creating a picture of the horizon, the ‘revolutionary’ description used by the researchers would therefore be fully justified.
Whether that’s the subject of this conference or not, we’ll give you an appointment on May 12 at 3:00 PM for this already announced conference. Fantastic in many ways† The announcement will be broadcast live on the ESO YouTube channel.
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