For the first time ever, astronomers have been able to measure light coming from the other side of a black hole. It was an unexpected discovery that the researchers made when they studied flashes of X-rays.
That light is bent around massive space bodies was predicted by Einstein’s general theory of relativity. Through this, they have mapped, among other things, how much dark matter there is in different places in the universe. Now a research team led by Dan Wilkins is on Stanfords university for the first time managed to observe light bent directly from the back of a black hole.
The starting point of the study was to study the corona around a black hole 800 million light-years away. A corona is a bright phenomenon that is found in some black holes, and which got its name as it resembles the sun’s corona. On black holes, it is formed by a rotating disk of hot gas that falls against the black hole and produces flashes of X-rays.
The light cone bends around the black hole
According to one theory, this gas is heated up to millions of degrees Celsius. Temperatures that cause electrons to separate from the atoms and create a magnetized plasma. Around the rapidly rotating black hole, high magnetic field arcs then rise in irregular shapes. Arches that are eventually broken. This releases the high-energy electrons, which in turn create X-rays that we can observe.
It was flashes of these X-rays that the researchers studied when, in addition to what they expected, they also saw smaller light signals, with different wavelengths. The smaller flashes correspond to reflections of the original flashes. The X-rays bounce on the disk of hot gas at the back of the black hole, and then bend around the black hole and reach us.
Can use ESA X-ray telescope
This is the first direct observation of light from the other side of a black hole, and will hopefully give us a greater understanding of these massive space bodies. In this study, measurement data came from the two space telescopes XMM-Newton and NuSTAR.
For further research, Dan Wilkins hopes to use ESA’s X-ray telescope Athena. A telescope that is expected to be launched into space at the beginning of the next decade. Athena has a larger mirror than the telescope used in this study, which will provide better resolution during shorter observation times.
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