mistertim Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 It's reported in multiple sources. Here's BBC https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-47873592 Quote Astronomers have taken the first ever image of a black hole, which is located in a distant galaxy. It measures 40 billion km across - three million times the size of the Earth - and has been described by scientists as "a monster". The black hole is 500 million trillion km away and was photographed by a network of eight telescopes across the world. Details have been published today in Astrophysical Journal Letters. Prof Heino Falcke, of Radboud University in the Netherlands, who proposed the experiment, told BBC News that the black hole was found in a galaxy called M87. "What we see is larger than the size of our entire Solar System," he said. "It has a mass 6.5 billion times that of the Sun. And it is one of the heaviest black holes that we think exists. It is an absolute monster, the heavyweight champion of black holes in the Universe." It probably doesn't mean much to people who aren't amateur physics nerds like me, but this is absolutely amazing IMO. Turns out that we were pretty damn close as far as what it looks like per general relativity calculations (so was Interstellar). The image may not look all that impressive but read about how difficult it was to obtain and how complex the apparatus was and it becomes much more eye popping. And the thing is bigger than our whole solar system. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
China Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 Is there theoretically a black hole in the center of the universe where the Big Bang happened? If so, wouldn't that then be bigger than this? Regardless, cool. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
No Excuses Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 So cool. The size of this thing is truly incredible. An absolute unit. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dfitzo53 Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RansomthePasserby Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 43 minutes ago, China said: Is there theoretically a black hole in the center of the universe where the Big Bang happened? If so, wouldn't that then be bigger than this? Regardless, cool. As I understand it, since all matter in the universe was involved in the big bag, the Big Bang happened everywhere. So actually there isn’t a single point in the universe where the Big Bang happened. There *is* a massive black hole at the center of the galaxy called Sagittarius A, but it’s only 60 million km in diameter. The black hole they took a picture of is 40 BILLION km in diameter, which is mind blowing. You can nerd me now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. Sinister Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 I was gonna post this yesterday. So cool. Hopefully one day we can start sending probes to one. Doubt we'll all be around for that part though Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
No Excuses Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 1 minute ago, Mr. Sinister said: I was gonna post this yesterday. So cool. Hopefully one day we can start sending probes to one. Doubt we'll all be around for that part though Ever feel like you were born in the wrong century? I feel like we are all getting a glimpse of the cool **** that will come in 100-500 years but will never get to truly experience humanity really venturing out into the universe. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TD_washingtonredskins Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 9 minutes ago, No Excuses said: Ever feel like you were born in the wrong century? I feel like we are all getting a glimpse of the cool **** that will come in 100-500 years but will never get to truly experience humanity really venturing out into the universe. I agree but that's always the case...imagine being born when it was becoming obvious that we would soon navigate the oceans? Or be able to build cars? Or fly to the moon? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HOF44 Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 It would somehow be so fitting if upon reaching a certain mass these Black holes generated big bangs of their own. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elessar78 Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 34 minutes ago, RansomthePasserby said: You can nerd me now. You did that yo' self. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. Sinister Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 37 minutes ago, No Excuses said: Ever feel like you were born in the wrong century? I feel like we are all getting a glimpse of the cool **** that will come in 100-500 years but will never get to truly experience humanity really venturing out into the universe. Kinda painful to think about. I remember being 11 years old around the time of y2k, thinking about all the cool flying cars and stuff I'd get to see in my lifetime. Really is too bad, but yeah, we've seen a lot. Lot of people didn't get to see what the universe even looked like with Hubble. Or what the outer planets looked like. Ditto for Pluto. I've been pretty lucky. But yeah, it's gonna suck Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sacks 'n' Stuff Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 I just downloaded the BBC app. It’s... not what I thought I was downloading. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TD_washingtonredskins Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 2 minutes ago, Sacks 'n' Stuff said: I just downloaded the BBC app. It’s... not what I thought I was downloading. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elessar78 Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 "massive black", "massive black holes", "black holes bbc" is not giving me good search results. Help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Springfield Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 This is definitely groundbreaking stuff. Truly a monument to what groups of scientists can accomplish. The amount of work that went into this is my blowing in its own respect. Never imagined that I’d get to see a (rendered) photo of a black hole. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistertim Posted April 10, 2019 Author Share Posted April 10, 2019 2 minutes ago, Elessar78 said: "massive black", "massive black holes", "black holes bbc" is not giving me good search results. Well, @Mr. Sinisterdid mention sending a probe into one as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CousinsCowgirl84 Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 Yeah, there is no black hole at the center of the universe (as far as scientific theory goes) But I think I remember reading some theory that the Big Bang was the result of a supermassive black hole and that the galaxy was expanding but eventually it would retract and form a new black hole. I think the newest theory is that expansion is accelerating so matter won’t collaps and instead the universe will end with a “big rip” where matter won’t be able to hold itself together. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HOF44 Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 2 minutes ago, CousinsCowgirl84 said: Yeah, there is no black hole at the center of the universe (as far as scientific theory goes) They have found a super massive black hole at the center of most every galaxy. Now the question is do the galaxies create the black holes or the black holes create the galaxies. Chicken and egg kind of thing. Dark matter/energy read about it, then nothing will make sense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mistertim Posted April 10, 2019 Author Share Posted April 10, 2019 Just for some mind-bending/expanding fun, this video is awesome and puts the nature of black holes in a different light (pun intended) and explains some misconceptions about them. That or it will just make the entire universe seem that much more confusing. Same difference. I actually recommend the PBS Space Time videos for all things quantum/relativity/cosmology related. They're amazing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warhead36 Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 2 hours ago, No Excuses said: Ever feel like you were born in the wrong century? I feel like we are all getting a glimpse of the cool **** that will come in 100-500 years but will never get to truly experience humanity really venturing out into the universe. Now I know how people who were born right before the discovery of America/the new world feel. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nonniey Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 1 hour ago, CousinsCowgirl84 said: Yeah, there is no black hole at the center of the universe (as far as scientific theory goes) But I think I remember reading some theory that the Big Bang was the result of a supermassive black hole and that the galaxy was expanding but eventually it would retract and form a new black hole. I think the newest theory is that expansion is accelerating so matter won’t collaps and instead the universe will end with a “big rip” where matter won’t be able to hold itself together. Believe that later theory was before the Dark matter hypothosis. Dark matter supposedly provides the mass necessary for eventual retraction to the super massive black whole (de ja vu?). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheGoodBits Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 3 hours ago, No Excuses said: Ever feel like you were born in the wrong century? I feel like we are all getting a glimpse of the cool **** that will come in 100-500 years but will never get to truly experience humanity really venturing out into the universe. Don't worry you aren't missing anything, humanity will destroy itself before we make any meaningful progress on interstellar exploration. #fermi Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Renegade7 Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 4 hours ago, No Excuses said: Ever feel like you were born in the wrong century? I feel like we are all getting a glimpse of the cool **** that will come in 100-500 years but will never get to truly experience humanity really venturing out into the universe. With the medical breakthroughs coming out, not clear yet what we might miss. I miss pre-smartphone days, glad I had as many memories from them as I do. 2 hours ago, HOF44 said: They have found a super massive black hole at the center of most every galaxy. Now the question is do the galaxies create the black holes or the black holes create the galaxies. Chicken and egg kind of thing. Dark matter/energy read about it, then nothing will make sense. Some of these supermassive black holes are too large to have been formed from sucking up matter around it. It's theorized that some of the ones the size of solar systems formed around the time of the first stars. Been around forever, plenty of time to absorb other black holes or just be large enough to begin with. Given something like that is showing to have an effect on galaxy creation, id make educated guess on supermassive black holes helping create galaxies instead of other way around. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Burgold Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 This is really, really cool stuff. Makes me miss the Prism all over again. I may just reach out to my NASA buddies for old times sake. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elessar78 Posted April 10, 2019 Share Posted April 10, 2019 She's posing with the 5 petabytes of data needed to image the black hole. (search terms: brunette girl next door black hole) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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