[ad_1]
In 1915, Albert Einstein formulated his theory of general relativity. Today, more than 100 years later, an extreme test proves once again that he was right.
A new study by the Observatory of Southern Europe (ESO) shows for the first time that his predictions were correct. on the movement of a star pbading through the intense gravitational field which is near a supermbadive black hole.
As if that were not enough, his theory was confirmed in much more extreme conditions than perhaps he had imagined
— Test pbaded —
The "examination" Einstein was to overcome was the supermbadive black hole closest to the Earth, called Sagittarius *, located 26 000 light years away, in the center of the Milky Way.
This hole has a mbad of four million times that of the Sun and has the most powerful gravitational field of our galaxy. This is why scientists call it a gravitational monster . "
This extreme environment makes it the ideal place to test Einstein's theory of general relativity . 19659006] This theory predicts that visible light must be affected by gravity, which causes the modification of its wavelength
Around Sagittarius A * several stars are turning.One of them is the S2, which ESO scientists have followed by a telescope in Chile, called Very Large Telescope (VLT, for its acronym in English)
Thanks to the VLT, the astronomers followed S2 when it came very close to Sagittarius A * , last May.
At its nearest point, the star became less than 20 000 million kilometers from the black hole and traveled more than 25 million kilometers per hour, which equates to nearly 3% of the speed of light.
— And what does it mean? —
These measurements confirm a phenomenon called " gravitational redistribution ", which involves moving starlight to longer wavelengths because of the strong field gravitational hole. black
Its name is due to the fact that the wavelength leans towards the red part of the light spectrum
And that's where Einstein appears triumphant : The change in length of the wave of light of S2 coincided precisely with that which he predicted in his theory of general relativity
The results showed that the ideas of the German scholar were true and in pbading they contradicted, less in this respect, the ideas of Isaac Newton who excluded the possibility of these changes of light.
"In sporting terms, we would say that it's a 1-0 for Einstein," he told the driving press Frank Eisenhauer, a researcher who manages VLT's measuring instruments
This confirmation is important, since it is the first time that this deviation of light was observed in the movement of a star around a supermbadive black hole. "Here, in the Solar System we can only test the laws of physics now and in certain circumstances," says Francoise Delplancke, head of the Department of Systems Engineering at ESO.
"In astronomy, it is very important to check that these laws are also valid where the gravitational fields are much stronger."
These discoveries help scientists better understand the gravity and the physics of black holes
And by the way, they serve to confirm that, again, Einstein got out ].
[ad_2]
Source link
