The Chandra X-ray Observatory helped discover two merging black holes a mere 3,000 light years apart
Posted 10.07.2009 at 2:15 pm
10 Comments
Black Hole Merger: Two pinpoints of light represent black holes in the center of this combined X-ray/optical image NASA/CXC/MIT/C.Canizares, M.Nowak/STScI
Chandra findings first led astrophysicists to pinpoint the two black holes in 2002. The black holes sit just 3,000 light years apart from one another in the NGC 6240 system, after a 30-million year cosmic dance that has brought them spiraling in closer to one another. They should ultimately merge into a super-massive black hole some tens or hundreds of millions of years from now.
Related Articles
 | Black Hole Threesome |
 | Sonic Disruptions Create Artificial Black Hole |
 | Supermassive Black Hole Takes a Nap |
Tags
Science, Jeremy Hsu, black holes, chandra, colliding, collision, galaxy, hubble, nasa, SpaceScientists believe that pairs of massive black holes can help explain the quirky behavior of super-massive black holes, which may form during common galaxy mergers and collisions. Many galaxies such as our own Milky Way contain a supermassive black hole in the center.
Such interest in gigantic mergers might explain why researchers have simulated black hole threesomes in the past. Not that there's anything wrong with it.
[NASA]
10 Comments
To comment, please Login.
Popular Tags
Technology
|
|
|
|
|
|
June 2013: American Energy Independence
Five amazing, clean technologies that will set us free, in this month's energy-focused issue. Also: how to build a better bomb detector, the robotic toys that are raising your children, a human catapult, the world's smallest arcade, and much more.
Popular on Popsci
Most Commented
Science
- Scientists Create First Cloned Human Embryo
- State Drops Charges Against High School Student Arrested For Science Experiment
- Dear Schools: Stop Treating Science-Curious Kids Like Criminals
- Mexican Cartels Control Pot Farms As Far North As Washington State
- Buzz Aldrin Wants To Send People On A One-Way Trip To Mars
- Giving White People The Illusion Of Darker Skin Makes Them Less Racist
- Space Tourism's Black Carbon Problem
- What Modern Humans Can Learn From The Neanderthals' Extinction
- Untouched For The Last Billion Years, Water In Canadian Mine Holds Ingredients For Life
- How Do You Make A Painkiller Addiction-Proof?
Most Emailed
Science
- The Week In Numbers: Fire In Space, The First Cloned Human Embryo, And More
- 8 Of The Year's Most Oddly Gorgeous Science Images
- 8 Of The Year's Most Oddly Gorgeous Science Images
- A Zombie Worm And Other Amazing Images From This Week
- A Zombie Worm And Other Amazing Images From This Week
- Cambrian Fossil With Scissor-Like Claws Is Named For Johnny Depp
- First American Mission To Sample An Asteroid Gets Green Light
- High School Students Devise More Accurate Climate Modeling Method
- Wanna Know How You're Going To Survive The Apocalypse?
- This Bacterium Can Do Division, Compute Logarithms And Take Square Roots
Most Viewed
Science
- The Week In Numbers: Fire In Space, The First Cloned Human Embryo, And More
- 8 Of The Year's Most Oddly Gorgeous Science Images
- 8 Of The Year's Most Oddly Gorgeous Science Images
- A Zombie Worm And Other Amazing Images From This Week
- A Zombie Worm And Other Amazing Images From This Week
- Cambrian Fossil With Scissor-Like Claws Is Named For Johnny Depp
- First American Mission To Sample An Asteroid Gets Green Light
- High School Students Devise More Accurate Climate Modeling Method
- Wanna Know How You're Going To Survive The Apocalypse?
- This Bacterium Can Do Division, Compute Logarithms And Take Square Roots
Online Content Director: Suzanne LaBarre | Email
Senior Editor: Paul Adams | Email
Associate Editor: Dan Nosowitz | Email
Assistant Editor: Colin Lecher | Email
Assistant Editor: Rose Pastore | Email
Contributing Writers:
Rebecca Boyle | Email
Kelsey D. Atherton | Email
Francie Diep | Email
Shaunacy Ferro | Email
Today on PopSci.com
Copyright © 2012 Popular Science
A Bonnier Corporation Company. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited.
Best. Title. Ever.
More that we do not understand about black holes.
Does this make you more comfortable with CERN?
He said "threesome"...
Heh, heh, heh.
If black holes take in light then how could scientists see this happen?
Black holes can't be seen but what is visible is their effect on the universe around them. Although we can't see light passed through or reflected off the black hole, the massive amounts of gravity have a visible effect on other objects out in space.
And yes more information that we do not understand about black holes makes me more comfortable with CERN -- it's research may help us understand more about this phenomenon and the structure of our own galaxy.
The photo was taken in X-Ray with an overlay of basic optical imagery. All that light is far to radiated to see normally. I think the larger black hole will consume the smaller one, right down to the math of the mass.
This may result in a quasar expelling Gamma radiation.
Beautiful photo.
www.darkfx.cjb.net
Although we can't see light passed through or reflected off the black hole, the massive amounts of gravity have a visible effect on other objects out in space.
www.cirurgia-plastica.com