By magnifying a region of space 6 billion light - years forth , astronomers have now measured the spin of a distant black trap — and holy crap do these things ever rotate quickly .
The quasar shown above is RX J1131 - 1231 . The striking image was fascinate by NASA ’s Chandra ecstasy - ray Observatory and the Hubble Space Telescope using a gravitational lensing proficiency . The extremely aglow quasi-stellar radio source is produced by a nearby supermassive black cakehole that ’s pulling in wall gas .
Black maw are typically measured according to two characteristic : mass and spin . Figuring out mass is relatively easy , but determining spin is another floor .
Because of the gravitational lens of the eye — which volunteer a magnified view of a distant neighborhood in space — the uranologist were able to get detailed information on the hug drug - ray spectrum — the amount of decade - ray of light seen at dissimilar Department of Energy . This in turn allowed them to get extremely accurate and unprecedented values for how tight the black hole is spinning .
The Chandra X - Ray Observatory excuse :
The X - ray are produce when a swirlingaccretion diskof throttle and debris that surround the black maw creates a multimillion - arcdegree swarm , or corona near the black hole . 10 - rays from this corona reflect off the privileged boundary of the accretion disc . The contemplate X - ray spectrum is alter by the strong gravitational force play near the black fix . The large the alteration in the spectrum , the closer the inner edge of the disc must be to the black hole .
The authors of the new written report found that the X - ray are fare from a region in the disc located only about three metre the radius of the consequence horizon , the point of no counter for infalling matter . This implies that the fatal hole must be spinning extremely apace to allow a disk to survive at such a little radius .
And by apace they mean approximately 150,000,000 meters per second base . This suggest that the grim hole grew via mergers , rather than pulling in material from different directions .
Last year , astronomers work out the spin of a supermassive black hole the substance of spiral galaxy NGC 1365 at a blistering 84 % the speed of ignitor . So technically talk it ’s not the first direct measure — but it may be the most accurate .
[ Chandra X - Ray Observatory ]
Image : X - ray : decade - ray : NASA / CXC / Univ of Michigan / R.C.Reis et al ; Optical : NASA / STScI
AstronomyBlack holesChandraScienceSpace
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