Durham: Black Hole's Heart Still Beating

Find out the latest thinking about our universe.
Post Reply
User avatar
bystander
Apathetic Retiree
Posts: 21571
Joined: Mon Aug 28, 2006 2:06 pm
Location: Oklahoma

Durham: Black Hole's Heart Still Beating

Post by bystander » Thu Jun 11, 2020 3:56 pm

Durham: Black Hole's Heart Still Beating
Durham University, UK | 2020 Jun 10
BH-Heartbeat.jpeg
A black hole including the heartbeat signal observed in 2007 and 2018.
Credit: Dr. Chichuan Jin of the National Astronomical Observatories,
Chinese Academy of Sciences and NASA GSFC Conceptual Image Lab

The first confirmed heartbeat of a supermassive black hole is still going strong more than ten years after first being observed.

X-ray satellite observations spotted the repeated beat after its signal had been blocked by our Sun for a number of years.

Our astronomers say this is the most long lived heartbeat ever seen in a black hole and tells us more about the size and structure close to its event horizon – the space around a black hole from which nothing, including light, can escape.

The black hole’s heartbeat was first detected in 2007 at the centre of a galaxy called RE J1034+396 which is approximately 600 million light years from Earth.

The signal from this galactic giant repeated every hour and this behaviour was seen in several snapshots taken before satellite observations were blocked by our Sun in 2011.

In 2018 the European Space Agency’s XMM-Newton X-ray satellite was able to finally re-observe the black hole and to scientists’ amazement the same repeated heartbeat could still be seen. ...

Re-Observing the NLS1 Galaxy RE J1034+396. I. The Long-Term, Recurrent
X-ray QPO with a High Significance
~ Chichuan Jin, Chris Done, Martin Ward
Know the quiet place within your heart and touch the rainbow of possibility; be
alive to the gentle breeze of communication, and please stop being such a jerk.
— Garrison Keillor

Post Reply