A necklace of young star clusters formed about 3.8 billion light-years from Earth may have formed after an extremely powerful explosion from a black hole, astronomers said.
Astronomers discovered one of the most powerful black hole explosions ever recorded in the system known as SDSS J1531+3414, or SDSS J1531 for short.
This structure, with a star pattern that resembles beads on a string, is located 3.8 billion light-years from Earth.
Scientists point out that SDSS J1531 is a huge galaxy cluster (galaxies that are gathered together due to the mutual gravitational force between galaxies) containing hundreds of individual galaxies and huge reservoirs of hot gas and dark matter. In the heart of SDSS J1531, two of the largest galaxies in the cluster collide with each other. .
Surrounding these merging giants is a group of 19 large star clusters (groups of stars grouped together as if they were clusters), called super star clusters, arranged in the shape of the letter S, resembling beads on a string.
Images of these “celestial jewels” were first revealed in 2014 by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope.
Astronomers now believe it was formed after an extremely powerful outpouring, equivalent to the energy produced by a billion stars like the Sun exploding together, from a supermassive black hole about four billion years ago.
This flow pushed the hot gas surrounding SDSS J1531 apart to form a huge cavity, much like a bubble.
Dr Timothy Davies, a researcher at the School of Physics and Astronomy at Cardiff University, said: “Just like a bubble in water, this cavity rises through the hot gas, and beads (star clusters) form when the gas is compressed in front of the bubble, allowing the material to cool and form regularly spaced star clusters.” “.
The team noted that its work, published in The Astrophysical Journal, could shed light on how black holes act as “cosmic thermostats” to prevent gas in galaxy clusters from collapsing.
Dr Davis added: “Black hole explosions, such as those that helped form the superclusters in SDSS J1531, are expected to be very important in keeping the gas in the galaxy clusters hot. Finding such clear evidence that this process is continuing allows us to “By understanding the influence of massive black holes on their environments.”
During the study, the team analyzed data from X-ray and optical radio telescopes and reconstructed the sequence of cosmic events.
The multi-wavelength data provides signs of an ancient giant eruption in SDSS J1531, which scientists believe was responsible for the creation of the 19 star clusters, because extremely powerful jets from supermassive black holes at the center of one of the large galaxies pushed the surrounding hot gas away from the black hole. , creating a giant cavity.
Evidence for the cavity comes from bright X-ray emission “wings” seen by Chandra tracking the dense gas near the center of SDSS J1531. These “wings” are the edge of the cavity and the less dense gas.
“We are actually looking at this system as it existed four billion years ago, not long after it formed,” said Osas Omoruyi, a graduate student who led the study at the Center for Astrophysics, a collaboration between the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory and the Harvard College Observatory in the United States. “This ancient cavity tells us about a major event that occurred about 200 million years ago in the history of the cluster.”
NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and Low Frequency Array (LOFAR), a radio telescope, detected radio waves and X-rays emanating from the edge of the cavity.
Dr. Davis noted: “This system clearly contains a very active black hole, which repeatedly explodes, strongly affecting the gas surrounding it, and here we discover the compelling evidence, and we see its effect all at once.”
Scientists said that they have also discovered only one jet so far from the black hole at the center of SDSS J1531, while black holes usually shoot two in opposite directions.
The team believes that the radio and X-ray signals detected may be the remains of the second jet.
The team said more observations are needed to confirm the eruption although “the evidence for this massive eruption is strong.”
