2023-05-06 20:00:00
Although it seems like a story taken from fiction, the deformation in the form of an “elongated noodle”, or spaghetting, that all kinds of matter undergo when coming into contact with a black hole is a real phenomenon. And it is that, the gravitational field generated by black holes is so strong that they manage to produce a certain stretch in all the objects that are around them. However, in the most extreme cases, the deformation force is so strong that no object can withstand it, no matter how strong its materials. In the hypothetical case that it was an astronaut, it would undoubtedly be similar to an act of medieval torture.
THE “SPAGHETIZATION” PHENOMENON
A black hole is a point of high density in the Universe, generated as a result of the explosion of a star in the form of a supernova in the last phases of its life. The force of gravity they generate is so powerful that virtually no object that goes into it can come outNot even the light. And it is that, in a standard case, some of these cosmological objects can have the mass of the sun (1.9 quettakilos, that is, the number 19 with 29 zeros to the right) in a single sphere of no more than 16 km in diameter. diameter.
Thus, when an individual is, for example, on the earth’s surface, the force of gravity that he experiences at his feet is a little stronger than that of his head, but this difference is so minimal that it does not suffer any type of consequence. . However, when an object approaches a black hole, the gravity in its lower part is much greater than that suffered on the upper part. This means that the bottom of the object feels pulled more strongly towards the center of the black hole (in fact, the further it is pulled in, the greater this difference in force), stretching it indefinitely. In the case of a human, it would eventually split in two, a somewhat bizarre image.
NASA
Simulation of the spaghetting phenomenon in an astronaut
The phenomenon would occur for all those objects in the vicinity of a black hole, from space dust to stars or, in a hypothetical case, astronauts. However, it is not known exactly what would happen just inside or, simply, the speed at which this phenomenon would occur. The expert Becky Smerthurst affirms in her book A brief history of black holes that the time between the fall and the spaghetting could be longer than is thought. “It would even involve time travel,” she writes, “it’s interesting to see how it would change your perception of time.”
This is what a black hole sounds like
AN INSTRUMENT OF TORTURE
So that anyone wants to get an idea of what this phenomenon would really mean for an astronaut, the scientists Stylianos Vasileios Kontomaris and Anna Malamou, from the University of Athens, published an article in 2018 where analyze the hypothetical event. In it, they assume an astronaut with a height of 1.70 m and a mass, including the suit itself, of 150 kg. They also establish the conditions that their helmeted head and booted feet have the same weight, 20 kg each, which makes their calculations easier.
For the calculations, they use a formula that relates the difference in force between the head and the feet with the masses of the feet and the head, the distance between them and the distance from the black hole itself. Thus, if they place the astronaut at a considerable distance from the hole, about 5,900 km, they obtain that they would experience the equivalent of supporting a weight of 40 kg attached to their feet a few meters from the earth’s surface: something uncomfortable but bearable.
However, as you get closer to the hole, the data is more worrying. At about 3,000 km they obtain what would be equivalent to supporting a weight of 310 kg by pulling on their feet, but at 1,500 km, a still conservative distance, the weight would be about 2,500 kg, which would tear the astronaut completely.
This star behaves in such a strange way that it ended up revealing the presence of a black hole
STARS AND BLACK HOLES
Scientifically, the event is known as “tidal disruption phenomenon”, and beyond the hypothetical case of the astronaut, it usually affects stars, rocks or star dust. However, the most curious of all is the capture of the stars, since it is visible from the great observatories of our planet. During the stellar spaghetting process, the strong gravity in the lower part of the star causes fine luminous threads of material to detach and end up inside the hole itself. This causes a very fine and fleeting shine which is captured by astronomers. Once these threads are detached, the star loses its shape and structure, which causes it to end up completely destroyed and absorbed by the black hole.
The last sighting of this type of stellar phenomenon was made in December 2022 and was dubbed under the name of AT2021ehb. It occurred 20 million light years from Earth and was a milestone, as it was an unprecedented study worldwide: for several months a chain of observatories from all over the world joined forces to study these light emissions, finally determining that It was about the capture of a star by a black hole.
UNMEASURABLE GRAVITY
The main cause for the spaghetting process to occur is, obviously, the enormous gravity that black holes have. And it is that this is so strong that it even has an influence on the light, managing to divert the light rays towards the hole and even capture them and not allow them to escape. This fact causes the holes to be, in reality, invisible points: they cannot be seen because the photons of light cannot leave their interior and do not reach the observer’s eyes.
However, it is possible to observe the so-called event horizon, that is, a ring of light determined by the photons located in the limit, from where they can escape. In addition to this method, to identify them despite their invisibility, astronomers manage to find them thanks to the visualization of objects revolving around a point where there seems to be “nothing”, or by certain light curvature experiences.
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