2023-06-27 12:52:01
According to the researchers, NASA’s IXPE space observatory detected an X-ray echo of this powerful resurgence of activity.
The supermassive black hole Sagittarius A* – abbreviated Sgr A* – is four million times more massive than the Sun. It is located 27,000 light years from Earth, in the center of the spiral of the Milky Way. In 2022, astronomers revealed the first image of the black hole, or rather, of the glowing ring of gas that surrounds its blackness.
Sgr A* “has always been considered a inactive black hole“, says Frederic Marin, a researcher at the Strasbourg Astronomical Observatory (France) and first author of the study.
Most of the supermassive black holes at the center of their galaxies go into torpor following engulfing all nearby matter. “Imagine a bear going into hibernation following devouring everything around it,” Marin explains.
But the international team of researchers discovered what, towards late nineteenth century, Sgr A* woke up from its torpor and consumed all the gas and dust that was nearby. This phenomenon lasted for several months to a year, before the black hole went into hibernation once more.
When it was active, the black hole was “at least a million times brighter than it is today,” Marin explains.
His awakening was perceptible because the nearby galactic molecular clouds began to emit a lot of more X-ray light. The increase in X-ray light was like “if a single firefly hidden in a forest suddenly became as bright as the Sun”, Explain the French research agency CNRS in a statement. Astronomers using NASA’s IXPE (Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer) space observatory got track the X-ray light and found that it was pointing directly at Sgr A*.
The black hole “emitted an echo of its past activity, which we were able to observe for the first time,” Marín said.
The gravitational pull from black holes is so intense that nothing can escape, not even light. But when matter is sucked past the final limit of the black hole, known as event horizonemits an enormous amount of heat and light before disappearing into darkness.
It is not yet known exactly what caused Sgr A* to briefly come out of its torpor state. Astronomers hope that the new observations from the IXPE observatory will help them better understand what happened, and perhaps reveal more regarding the origin of black holes. supermassivewhich is still shrouded in mystery.
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