Astroboffins disconcerted by a black hole in the center of the Milky Way suddenly become more hungry than before • The Register

"We've never seen him eat so much for over 20 years!

Artist's view of a star S0-2 in orbit near the black hole

Video The giant black hole that lies at the heart of our galaxy The Milky Way is more hungry than ever and is currently feeding the largest meal ever seen in a quarter of a century.

A team of scientists led by the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) analyzed more than 13,000 measurements taken respectively by the very large telescopes and Keck telescopes in Chile and Hawaii. For more than 130 days, they studied the shine emanating from the center of the Milky Way, caused in part by the energy released when the black hole feeds on gas and dust.

The team discovered "unprecedented" levels of near-infrared wavelengths and strange fluctuations that deviate from normal behavior, according to an article in The Astrophysical Journal Letters. The brightest flux levels observed this year are twice as strong as those observed by the two observatories.

"We have never seen anything like it for 24 years as we study the supermassive black hole," said Andrea Ghez, co-author of the study and professor of physics and astronomy at UCLA. . "It's usually a rather calm black hole and wimpy in a diet. We do not know what motivates this great feast. "

You can watch a video of some of the images taken with the telescopes and which shows below that it is flashing.

Youtube video

Known as Sagittarius A *, the monstrous void is estimated to be over 4 million times the size of the Sun. https://arxiv.org/pdf/0810.4674.pdf It is possible that his appetite is rising steadily or that he may be devouring an unusually large snack.

"The big question is whether the black hole enters a new phase – for example, if the" valve "was mounted and the flow of gas falling into the" black hole "of the black hole increased for an extended period of time – or if we've just seen the fireworks from a few unusual gas drops, "said Mark Morris, co-author of the paper and professor of physics and astronomy at UCLA .

The team will continue to monitor Sagittarius A * on different wavelengths to see if it is still missing. "We want to know how black holes develop and affect the evolution of galaxies and the universe. We want to know why the supermassive hole becomes brighter and how it becomes, "concluded Ghez. ®

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