Thread by @BiIndia

A #BlackHole warped space-time so much that astronomers saw flashes of light from its far side

#discovery #space @KIPAC1

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@KIPAC1 For the first time, scientists have seen the light behind a black hole.

Because no light can pass through a #BlackHole and come out the other side, the discovery further confirms #AlbertEinstein's theory that massive objects, like black holes and neutron stars, warp space.

@KIPAC1 This particular black hole, 800 million light-years away, was distorting space so much that astronomers could see X-ray explosions flashing behind it.

#BlackHole #discovery #space @KIPAC1

@KIPAC1 "Any light that goes into that black hole doesn't come out, so we shouldn't be able to see anything that's behind the black hole," Dan Wilkins, a researcher at Stanford's Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology, said in a press release.

#BlackHole #space @KIPAC1

@KIPAC1 According to Einstein's theory of general relativity, massive objects warp the fabric space-time. Instead of continuing in a linear fashion, space-time bends around them, creating curved paths that other objects must follow as they travel. That, Einstein said, is gravity.

@KIPAC1 In the same way gravity forces a planet to orbit a star, light should follow the same curved path around objects like black holes, which can have the mass of billions of suns. But nobody had ever observed a black hole bending and warping the light behind it until now

#BlackHole

@KIPAC1 From this hot, spinning disc, magnetic fields arc away from the #BlackHole in huge loops, then twist and snap, exploding in bright flashes of X-ray light. It looks similar to what happens on the surface of our sun (the outermost layer of which is called the corona).

@KIPAC1 But as the researchers observed these bursts of light, they also detected smaller, slightly delayed flashes in different colors. These mystery flashes seem to be the bent light of coronas on the other side of the black hole.

#BlackHole #space @KIPAC1

@KIPAC1 Wilkins hopes to continue studying black-hole coronas with a future space-based X-ray observatory, the Advanced Telescope for High-ENergy Astrophysics (Athena).

#BlackHole #space @KIPAC1