Scientists Excited By Possible Discovery Of A Black Hole
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16 November 2010 | posted by: Martin Shaffer | No Comment
Scientists who have been studying the remnants of the explosion of a supernova that occurred 30 years ago are now enthralled by the fact that a black hole could have developed. The belief that it is a black hole is founded on the fact that they have observed something steadily eating up the gassy remnants of the exploded star. Black Hole A black hole is a warped region in space where it is so dense that nothing is able to get away, including light. Harvard astrophysicist, Avi Loeb, said that since the star exploded a baby black hole had developed, and had eaten an equivalent of the Earth in terms of mass. NASA astrophysicist said that although this is not very large in the context of a comic scale, it is quite a feat from the point of view of Earth. Scientists have observed energy bursts from matter as it is vacuumed in. The consumed matter is in the form of heavy gas from the exploded star and a possible partner star. Loeb, who co-authored a paper in the journal, New Astronomy, on the issue, said that it was the first time scientists were observing a black hole being born in a normal supernova. The astronomers continue to follow the black hole, which will enable future studies in astronomy to verify how much material will remain from the explosion. Images of the black hole which is about five times bigger than the sun were captured by the Chandra X-Ray space telescope. Although it could be possible that the scientists are really only observing the birth of a pulsar wind nebula, co-author Dan Patnaude of Harvard stated that a black hole was the most probable explanation. |
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