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First Image of Black Hole Released

The first ever image of a black hole has been released by the Event Horizon Telescope project team.

By Three of Seven Wed 10 Apr, 2019 2:15 PM
Astronomers from an international science team, the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) project, which bagan in 2012, have today released an image of the first ever black hole. This image came out from a network of telescopes, which help to get a picture of objects with large gravitational objects. The black hole is approximatly 500 million-trillion km away from the network of telescopes, as for the hole itself, it measures 40 billion km across. It's location is at the centre of Messier 87, a massive galaxy in the nearby Virgo galaxy cluster.

Name:  blackholepreinline.png
Views: 192
Size:  74.6 KBTo the left, you can see the image released by the team, surrounded by a halo of bright gasses pulled in by the gravity of the hole. Prof Heino Falcke, of Radboud University in the Netherlands, who floated the idea of the project, told the BBC "What we see is larger than the size of our entire Solar System," and said that the mass is "6.5 billion times that of the Sun.".

This is a huge day in astrophysics,” said U.S. National Science Foundation Director France Córdova. “We’re seeing the unseeable.

Black holes have once been speculated to exist, with the effects observed, and artists making their own impressions of what they might look it. The collaborative project will grow its number of telescopes, which should increase any detail scientists can get out of the images in future.

Of course, getting images of a black hole will be always be a challenge, as they do not allow light to escape from them, meaning that what is looked for is a ring of light, in a disrupted fashion. This allows for a pattern to be seen over time, and an image to be created, which is what we see today. Astrophysicist Dimitrios Psaltis of the University of Arizona, the EHT project scientist, said, “The size and shape of the shadow matches the precise predictions of Einstein’s general theory of relativity, increasing our confidence in this century-old theory.

Currenty, the black hole is yet unnamed, but no doubt, there is a team working on finding an appropriate name for the first ever image of a black hole. If you were going to give it a name, what would you give it? Also, are you excited to see this kind of project bare fruit?

WRITTEN & EDITED BY Three of Seven - rena.hobden@ufplanets.com
10 Comments
Wed 10 Apr, 2019 2:41 PM
Cool!
Wed 10 Apr, 2019 2:43 PM
Neato
Wed 10 Apr, 2019 2:57 PM
An amazing presentation.

Although what we see is in fact an image many-many years in the past. This galaxy is almost 54 million light years from us.
Wed 10 Apr, 2019 5:01 PM
And here is the video of the presentation:

Wed 10 Apr, 2019 9:59 PM
Beautiful I’m its own unique way!
Thu 11 Apr, 2019 6:51 AM
This is a great day for our planet !
Thu 11 Apr, 2019 2:20 PM
Size of our entire solar system? I’ll be damned...

So wait, that black hole could have the power to pull-in nearby solar systems too?
Fri 26 Apr, 2019 1:38 PM
It's a very beautiful and amazing picture. Sadly Stephen Hawking couldn't see it.
Sun 28 Apr, 2019 10:20 AM
Yes, a very good point. Live Long and Prosper
Sun 28 Apr, 2019 11:51 AM
It's a very beautiful and amazing picture. Sadly Stephen Hawking couldn't see it.
I believe he is seeing it...