Black holes are areas of space so dense that irresistible gravitational force stops the escape of matter, gas and even light, rendering them invisible and creating the effect of a void in the fabric of space.
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The finding supports previous predictions that when a black hole is fed a large amount of gas, the result is a high-speed jet of plasma that can make its way past the black hole’s event horizon.
The researchers compared the process in which black holes swallow matter with that of the moon’s tidal forces that tend to pull earth’s oceans towards it. Study authors said this same mechanism was used by the black hole to swallow up the entire star.
Black holes present a surge of complex scientific questions, particularly about its power and extent of strength. This galaxy is about 300 million light years away, while the others were at least three times farther away.
After ruling out the possibility that the light excretion was due to an “accretion disk”, which is a large, swirling mass that occurs due to a black hole drawing in matter from space, the scientists confirmed that the light released from the galaxy was stimulated by a trapped star. While this is strongly believed, astronomers have never observed such event as per radio follow-up monitoring.
A team of 14 scientists from the US, Britain, Australia and the Netherlands, led by a scientist from the John Hopkins University analyzed the data and explained all of it in a research paper.
Black holes are hungry, and apparently don’t care for good manners.
“The jets being observed coming from this event are producing more energy than the Sun produces in 10 million years”, Dr Anderson said.
Astronomers were able to observe how a star as huge as the Sun was swallowed by a supermassive black hole. The black hole engulfed the star within a matter of weeks. Scientists managed to see it using both optical as well as radio telescopes.
The first observation of the star being destroyed was made by a team at the Ohio State University, using an optical telescope in Hawaii. Although jets were spotted before, the actual destruction of the star is something new.
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This artist’s impression shows a supermassive black hole consuming a star that has been torn apart by the black hole’s gravity; as a result of this “meal” the black hole begins to launch a powerful jet that astronomers can detect with radio telescopes. What happens is that the stellar debris forming streams that are located on the disk can very quickly form into jets.
