It's hard to get the basics right black hole. From event horizons singularity points and general collapse spacetime As far as we understand it, the list goes on. However, you don't have to be an astrophysicist to understand the enormity of the cosmic event recently recorded by researchers at Caltech's Palomar Observatory.
Using Temporary Zwicky complex (ZTF) and Catalina real-time transient research, the team witnessed supermassive black hole About 500 million times more massive than the Sun, it feeds on a nearby star for months at a time. At one point, the resulting black hole flash was 30 times brighter than any similar scene in history, creating 10 trillion light worthy of the sun. Activity active galactic nucleus (AGN) J2245+3743 are detailed in a study published November 4 in the journal Nature Astronomy.
“This is unlike any AGN we've ever seen,” Caltech astronomy professor, ZTF project scientist and study co-author Matthew Graham. says the statement.
40 times lighter
Graham and his colleagues first noticed an increase in the luminosity of J2245+3743 on April 2, 2018. However, initial scans using Palomar Observatory's 200-inch Hale Telescope did not reveal anything particularly strange. But by 2023, astronomers realized that the flare was fading more slowly than expected. And only after another scan of the spectrum at the observatory of V.M. Keck in Hawaii, they learned how bright J2245+3743 had become. Ultimately, astronomers observed the AGN burst increasing in energy by a factor of 40.
Initially, the team wasn't entirely sure what could have caused such a sudden explosion and ran through a list of possibilities. They quickly determined that the most obvious explanation—supermova—simply didn't apply.
“Supernovae are not bright enough to explain this,” explained study co-author and City University of New York astronomer C.E. Saavik Ford. “If we convert our entire Sun into energy using Albert Einstein's famous formula E=mc2, that's exactly how much energy has poured out of this flare since we started observing it.”
What is tidal disruption?
Graham, Ford and their team eventually settled on tidal disruption event as the most likely explanation for this flash of light. Tidal disruption, also known as TDE, begins when the giant gravitational pull of a supermassive black hole captures a nearby star. The black hole then begins to drain the star's energy, entering an inevitable death spiral. But this does not mean that the star constantly contracts after it is captured by an AGN. Sometimes energy transfer is a two-way street.
“Stars of this mass are rare, but we think stars inside the AGN disk could grow larger. Matter from the disk is dumped onto the stars, causing them to grow in mass,” Ford said.
To date, about 100 tidal disruption events have been recorded, but most do not have an active galactic nucleus, like the recently discovered J2245+3743. This is because the disk of feeding material surrounding the active galactic nucleus typically obscures any TDE emissions from even the observatory's most sensitive instruments. In this case, J2245+3743 was so gigantic that it was impossible to miss.
The new record holder is much more powerful than the previous top-level TDE. First observed in April 2021, ZTF20abrbeie (nicknamed “Scary Barbie“”) was ultimately 30 times fainter than J2245+3743 and included a star 3 to 10 times the size of the Sun. J2245+3743, located 10 billion light-years away, is also one of the oldest black holes ever observed, and formed when the Universe was relatively young.
Slow motion black hole
Given all the weirdness that accompanies a black hole, astronomers are technically watching things happen in slow motion.
“This phenomenon is called cosmological time dilation due to the stretching of space and time. As light passes through expanding space to reach us, its wavelength is stretched, just like time itself,” Graham said. “Seven years here, two years there. We're watching events play out at quarter speed.”
Although J2245+3743 currently holds the record for the brightest black hole flare ever observed, astronomers say its top spot may not be permanent. As powerful as it is, they suspect similar events are happening throughout the universe at any given time. Only by watching the sky will they find worthy competitors.
“We would never have discovered this rare phenomenon if not for ZTF,” Graham said. “We've been monitoring the sky with ZTF for seven years now, so when we see something flaring or changing, we can see what it did in the past and how it will evolve.”
As for J2245+3743, it's not quite finished with its stellar appetizer. Even after two years of existence, the AGN flux still remains two magnitudes higher than the pre-flare level.
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