2023-09-07 17:56:01
A team of astronomers from the University of Leicester in the United Kingdom has identified an extraordinary cosmic phenomenon: A star similar to our Sun is gradually being devoured by a small but voracious black hole. This surprising finding, published in the journal Nature Astronomysheds light on a little-explored area of astronomy: the interaction between black holes and orbiting stars.
Swift J0230, a threatened white dwarf
The protagonist of this fascinating cosmic story is Swift J0230, a white dwarf located regarding 500 million light years from the Milky Way, in the nearby galaxy 2MASX J02301709+2836050. This star gives off a mass equivalent to three times that of Earth every time it passes close to the black hole. Astronomers have dubbed this process a “tidal disruption event,” and it is the first time such a phenomenon has been observed with a Sun-like star.
Most intriguing regarding this discovery is the regularity of the event of Swift J0230. Unlike previous observations in which stars lost material intermittently, this event appears to follow a more consistent pattern, as if it were the “missing link” between two types of stellar flares.
An unusual pattern: regularity
Phil Evans, a researcher at the University of Leicester and lead author of the study, highlighted the uniqueness of this phenomenon, noting that these events fall into two categories: those that go off every few hours and those that go off every year or so. Swift J0230 sits right in the middle of this scale, repeating the process every 25 days, making it an exciting discovery for astronomy.
Although the black hole that is devouring Swift J0230 is relatively small, with an estimated mass between 10,000 and 100,000 times that of our Sun, it is a reminder of the voracity of these cosmic phenomena. By comparison, the supermassive black holes found at the center of many galaxies can be millions of times larger.
A little explored area
The discovery of Swift J0230 was made possible by the new transient detector on the Swift satellite, developed by the team at the University of Leicester. The observations revealed an unusual bright pattern on the rapidly fading star, suggesting that the star becomes elusive during its encounter with the black hole.
Despite the fascination that this discovery has generated in the scientific community, unanswered questions remain. Astronomers still don’t fully understand why this black hole is only partially destroying the star. Previous research has suggested that the distance between a star and a black hole is an important factor, but the initial density of the star also plays a crucial role in this process, according to a previous study carried out with a supercomputer.
ies (EFE, Nature Astronomy)
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