Astronomy, features and articles | Educational Science

Apr 10, 2023

'Runaway' black hole the size of 20 million suns caught speeding through space with a trail of newborn stars behind it

Astronomers have spotted a runaway supermassive black hole, seemingly ejected from its home galaxy and racing through space with a chain of stars trailing in its wake. According to the team's research, which was published April 6 in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, the discovery offers the first observational evidence that...

Apr 12, 2023

NASA discovers ultra-rare 'double quasar' about to collide into an unbelievably massive black hole

After 33 years, the Hubble Space Telescope is still uncovering new cosmic surprises. The venerable instrument recently added to its extensive catalog of finds when it spotted a rare double quasar blazing away in the distant reaches of the universe. Researchers published a paper detailing the discovery on April 5...

Apr 13, 2023

First-ever close-up of a supermassive black hole sharpened to 'full resolution' by AI, and the results are stunning

The first-ever photo of a supermassive black hole has gotten a maximum resolution makeover, thanks to artificial intelligence (AI). The iconic 2019 image of M87*, a solar system-size black hole in the center of the Virgo galaxy cluster, was made by pooling radio light that had traveled to us across...

Apr 13, 2023

The most elusive black holes in the universe could lurk at the Milky Way's center

The most elusive black holes in the universe aren't the big ones, or the small ones. They're the medium ones — and a team of astronomers has proposed a new method, using ripples in space-time, to hunt for them. Known black holes come in two general varieties. There are the...

Apr 27, 2023

Behold the first direct image of a supermassive black hole spewing a jet of particles

Astronomers have photographed a black hole spewing a powerful jet of material at near light speeds for the very first time. The jet is being launched from around the event horizon (the point beyond from which no matter can escape) of the black hole M87*, the first black hole to...

Apr 27, 2023

Meet 'Scary Barbie,' a black hole slaughtering a star in the brightest way possible

Astronomers have detected one of the longest, brightest and most energetic cosmic objects ever observed — and they've named it Scary Barbie, in part due to its terrifying power. The remote object, an astonishingly bright flash of light that has lasted for more than two years, was discovered lurking inside...

Apr 29, 2023

The most powerful black holes in the universe may finally have an explanation

Scientists may have solved a 60-year-old mystery by discovering that quasars — energetic objects that are powered by ravenous supermassive black holes and can outshine trillions of stars combined — form when galaxies collide and merge. The findings indicate that the Milky Way could host a quasar of its own...

May 2, 2023

Scientists discover closest star-shredding black hole to Earth ever seen

A long time ago, in a galaxy not so far away, a supermassive black hole ripped a star to shreds in the center of the galaxy NGC 7392. The flash of light from the black hole's dinner finally reached Earth in 2014 — and astronomers just discovered it in their...

May 11, 2023

'Runaway black hole,' or sneaky galaxy in disguise? Experts are conflicted.

A mysterious streak of stars coursing through space like a vast, cosmic river has astronomers conflicted. Is it the result of a renegade black hole surging through space, or is it a bizarrely flat galaxy in disguise? New research makes the case for the latter – but the mystery is...

May 11, 2023

A messy black hole may have just triggered the largest explosion in the universe

Astronomers have spotted the most powerful cosmic explosion ever seen — a mysterious, years-long eruption 10 times brighter than any observed supernova. Astronomers spotted the event, named AT2021lwx, 8 billion light-years from Earth. Releasing roughly 100 times the energy the sun will release over its entire lifetime, the strange explosion...

May 17, 2023

Some black holes may actually be tangles in the fabric of space-time, new research suggests

Physicists have discovered a strange twist of space-time that can mimic black holes — until you get too close. Known as topological solitons, these theoretical kinks in the fabric of space-time could lurk all around the universe – and finding them could push forward our understanding of quantum physics, according...

May 18, 2023

Scientists grow swirling 'black hole rings' in the lab for the 1st time

Scientists have created superheated rings of plasma that mimic the shining accretion disks that rotate around black holes at incredible speeds. The lab experiments could shed light on how black holes grow. An accretion disk is a ring of superheated plasma, or ionized gas, that spins around a black hole's...

May 23, 2023

Strange star system may hold first evidence of an ultra-rare 'dark matter star'

Astronomers long thought that a peculiar star system observed by the European Space Agency's Gaia satellite was a simple case of a star orbiting a black hole. But now, two astronomers are challenging that claim, finding that the evidence suggests something far stranger: possibly, a never-before-seen type of star made...

May 25, 2023

Gravitational wave lab LIGO roars back online to detect the oldest black hole collisions ever seen

On May 24, scientists at the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) began an 18-month campaign to detect the most distant collisions between black holes and neutron stars ever observed. We're very excited, said Michael Landry, head of LIGO Hanford Observatory. Thanks to upgrades, LIGO's detectors are now so sensitive they...

May 25, 2023

A rare type of black hole never proven to exist could be orbiting our galaxy right now, Hubble telescope reveals

The Hubble Space Telescope may have just found a rare missing link black hole hiding in Earth's cosmic backyard. Located roughly 6,000 light-years away at the core of the nearby star cluster Messier 4, the intermediate-mass black hole candidate is an ultradense region of space packed with the mass of...