Supermassive Black Holes: The Real Monster?

irza (53)in #science • 7 years ago (edited)

Black holes are known for their destructive behavior, for example, capable of destroying stars and planets and swallowing them round. But, in fact, the black hole is also a valuable member of the cosmic community. The black holes return large amounts of energy to the universe.

Born in the middle of material bursts of supermassive black holes

^{Illustration of star formation in the burst of material thrown from supermassive black holes in the center of the galaxy.wikipedia}

The supermassive black hole hid and lurked in the center of most of the galaxies and devoured nearby cosmic gas and dust. As the black hole eats, energy is released and heats up the surrounding matter. These materials are then ejected from the galaxy in both directions. An artist creates this cool image to show the captivating jets formed by the process.

Nearly all major galactic centers are thought to be inhabited by supermassive black holes. So, this kind of bursts is quite common. Nevertheless, there is something interesting in this newly discovered image for the first time: new stars are formed in the terrible burst of material thrown out of supermassive black holes! Can you find it?

These young stars grew up in the wild environment they consider to be home. The stars are hotter and brighter than the other stars formed in the main part of the galaxy.

The stars are also much more active. Many of them are moving quickly away from the center of the galaxy. The stars that form at the furthest location from the center of the galaxy are at risk apart from the galaxy and spend the rest of their lives in the darkness of space alone!

^{Artist's illustration of galaxy with jets from a supermassive black hole..wikipedia}

The stars formed near the center of the galaxy face opposite risks: the gravitational gravity of the galaxy will ultimately slow down its course until the star retreats toward the center of the galaxy. Meanwhile, the black hole is waiting there.

This discovery could answer questions that have been puzzling astronomers over the years: how the center of spiral galaxies can be somewhat bulging in the center like apple cake or pancake.

This discovery can also solve the mystery of how chemicals (eg, oxygen) can exist in the intergalactic space. If the stars are thrown from the galaxy then explode, the chemicals in it will splatter in space.

When the supermassive black hole is stripped of its galaxy

There is interesting news. Astronomers find supermassive black holes that are alone in the universe. Themselves here means there are not any stars around the black hole. It does not live in the center of a galaxy like a supermassive black hole in general.

^{Hubble view of a supermassive black hole "burping"..wikipedia}

As the name suggests, the supermassive black hole has an enormous mass. It can reach millions to billions of times the mass of black holes formed when the star ends its life. The black hole of the evolution of stars can indeed be found alone or in a star system together. But not so with supermassive black holes. It lives in the center of big galaxies.

Until now, how the supermassive black hole is still seeking the answer. There are several theories put forward related to its formation. One of them, the supermassive black hole is formed from the early generation black hole which then grows into big after devouring stars and gas around it.

Another scenario, supermassive black holes are formed from the incorporation of black holes into the cores of small galaxies as they collide with each other. This is common in the past of the universe when the size of the universe is smaller than it is now and interactions are more frequent.

When two galaxies collide, in addition to black holes merge into black holes that are more massive than ever, the two black holes can also end up mutually orbiting each other. The collision footprint of two galaxies in the form of a pair of supermassive orbiting supermassive holes is sought by astronomers led by James Condon, from the National Radio Astronomy Observatory.

The observations on the 1200 galaxies they do give a known result. Supermassive black holes are found living in the center of the galaxy.

But, something interesting.

There is a supermassive black hole in the cluster of ZwCl 8193 galaxies that do not follow the rules. It is found almost naked as newly stripped of his clothes and is moving away from the large galactic nucleus at speeds of more than 3200 km per second. It is known from the traces of ionized gas that he left along the way. This black hole is named B3 1715 + 425 or we are short B3. Around it also found galaxies much smaller and dimmer.

The black hole B3 along with the cluster of galaxies where it lives is very far from Earth. The distance is 2 billion light years from Earth. It seems that the solitude of B3 has its own story.

^{Artist impression of a supermassive black hole at the center of a galaxy,wikipedia}

Just like other supermassive black holes, B3 also once lived at the center of a galaxy. But, in the course of millions of years ago, he encountered a larger galaxy. When met, the interaction between B3 and supermassive black holes in the larger galaxy did not result in a much more massive black hole or two black orbiting orbits. A small galaxy where the supermassive black hole B3 shelves are stripped of the stars and the gas that surrounds it. As a result only remaining black hole that is the B3 and traces the remains of small galaxies whose size is now only 3000 light years. Compare with the Milky Way whose diameter is 100 000 light years.

^{Artist’s impression of supermassive black hole seed..wikipedia}

The supermassive black holes B3 and the rest of the galaxy will someday not be detected by us. His journey will cause a greater mass loss and a new star will not be formed here either. In a few billion years, all that's left is a B3 black hole with nothing around it. And when that happens, the black hole B3 will disappear from sight and undetected, because astronomers will not find a black hole if there is no more interaction with the surrounding matter. The fingerprint of an object in the universe comes from the light we receive on Earth. Without any light at any wavelength that can escape the black hole, there is no information we can receive.

Looking at the existence of B3, astronomers suspect there are more supermassive black holes of a kind that are no longer detected after being stripped by larger galaxies when passing in the early days of the universe. Only now no more information we can receive from them.

How massive is the supermassive

We have long discussed how massive cosmic objects are, but how massive is massive?

When we say something is massive, we are not talking about its size or magnitude. The mass relates to how much matter an object contains. Although the sweetest fragrant size of your head is bigger than a bar of chocolate, the sweet fragrance contains less material so it is not so massive. Try to flake the sweet fragrance with your hand and you will understand what I mean!

Astronomers have just measured the mass of about 50 supermassive black holes that are very far away and found that each black hole is at least five million times more massive than the Sun!

For the first time, the mass of so many supermassive black holes that are so far away can be measured directly given the difficulty of researching black holes.

^{An illustration showing the environment around a supermassive black hole that is preying on the surrounding matter,pixabay}

Most telescopes capture only light, but the black hole's gravity is so strong that even light can not escape its appeal. That's why black holes are not visible to our telescopes and this means the researchers must be very creative if they want to research the black hole.

In order to measure the mass of the black hole, the scientists used a technique which, in principle, observed the brightness of the matter near the black hole (eg, cosmic gas and dust) and compared it with the brightness of further matter.

Anything that changes the inner brightness of the material will also change the material on the outside, but it happens later. By measuring the time lag, astronomers can calculate the gas distance from the black hole. This information is then used to calculate the mass of the black hole even though they can not see the details of the black hole itself!

Info: The larger mass object will have stronger gravity. That's why Earth's gravity is stronger than the Moon's gravity. The gravity of the Moon that is not as strong as gravity on Earth causes astronauts on the Moon's surface to jump high. Thanks!