2024-05-14 06:24:22
NASA of the United States released a picture of the supermassive black hole feeding in the center of the Andromeda Galaxy on May 9, 2024. (NASA/JPL-Caltech)
[The Epoch Times, May 14, 2024](Epoch Times reporter Chen Juncun reported) The Andromeda galaxy is a galaxy adjacent to the Milky Way. Both galaxies have supermassive black holes in their centers. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) recently released an image that shows how the supermassive black hole in the center of the Andromeda Galaxy swallows matter, which helps scientists understand the “eating habits” of supermassive black holes.
NASA pointed out in a press release issued on May 9 that this image was previously taken by the agency’s retired Spitzer Space Telescope. It shows the flow of dust toward the supermassive black hole at the center of the Andromeda Galaxy. This could explain how a black hole billions of times more massive than our sun can feed continuously but quietly.
When a supermassive black hole devours gas and dust, the material is heated and produces intense light, sometimes brighter than an entire galaxy full of stars. As a black hole swallows matter of different sizes, its brightness will fluctuate.
However, in this universe, the black holes at the centers of the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies are quiet eaters. The light they emit is not very bright, which means they eat in small but steady doses rather than gorging themselves on it.
As can be seen from NASA’s images, the dust flow enters the black hole bit by bit in a spiral shape, much like water flowing into a drain pipe in a spiral shape.
In a study published earlier this year, researchers used computers to simulate how gas and dust near the supermassive black hole at the center of the Andromeda Galaxy changes over time. It was found that the hot gas will form a small disk near the black hole, and then continue to be swallowed by the black hole, and this disk will be continuously replenished by gas and dust.
But the researchers also found that these streams of gas and dust must maintain certain sizes and flow rates. Otherwise, the material would be sucked into the black hole in irregular clumps, causing larger fluctuations in the brightness of the light.
When the researchers compared their findings with data from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope and Spitzer Space Telescope, they learned that the spiral dust previously detected by the Spitzer Space Telescope The stream conforms to these restrictions.
Therefore, the researchers concluded that these spiral dust streams are the “food” being eaten by the supermassive black hole at the center of the Andromeda Galaxy.
The Andromeda Galaxy is very close to the Milky Way, so when viewed from Earth, the Andromeda Galaxy is larger than other galaxies. If viewed with the naked eye, the Andromeda Galaxy is approximately 6 times as wide as the Moon. Even though the Spitzer Space Telescope has a larger field of view than the Hubble Space Telescope, it still had to take 11,000 images to assemble the comprehensive image released by NASA.
As for what happens to matter after it is sucked into a supermassive black hole? NASA recently used a supercomputer to simulate an animation that shows an observer entering the event horizon (the boundary of a black hole), unable to escape the black hole’s huge gravity, and eventually being destroyed. It all happens in an instant.
Editor in charge: Wu Hao#
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