event horizon telescope milky way black hole

Astonishingly, the predicted ring of radiation narrowly escaping the clutches of the black hole is visible at a magnification equivalent to what would be needed if the doughnut was located on the Moon.įor me personally, the image is a staggering illustration of how far astronomical science has come since I started my research career in the 1970s, because I, too, observed objects near the centre of our Milky Way Galaxy. It shows the shadow of a black hole containing 4.1 million times the mass of the Sun at the very heart of our Milky Way Galaxy, clearly defined by a telescope the size of the Earth. Its resemblance to a humble cream doughnut belies the extraordinary technological achievement it represents.

This evening, a remarkable image has grabbed the attention of the world’s media. With such experiments finally starting to catch up with theory, this is the advent of a new era of black hole physics!' That they agree with Einstein's theory is an amazing testament to the strength of the theory. M87 and Sgr A* are only the beginning of a direct glimpse into black holes. Sgr A*, on the other hand, is much quieter in these aspects and can provide a much more pristine laboratory for explaining and advancing the physics of black holes.Įinstein's theory of general relativity has been way ahead of experiments for over a century. These astrophysical effects need to be carefully considered and separated in order to get to the heart of the black hole physics. M87, harbouring a very active black hole, with its enormous accretion and gigantic jets piercing through the galaxy at relativistic speeds has a lot more astrophysics happening in its vicinity. The image of the Milky Way black hole is not just 'more of the same.' The relative quietness of the Milky Way Black Hole relative to the M87 black hole can provide a significant advantage in advancing our understanding of black holes. However, this is only a first glimpse into the black hole at the centre of our Milky Way ongoing telescope upgrades should provide sharper images, and the next-generation facility being planned is aiming to provide real-time movies of black holes, allowing us to study the turbulent environment around these exotic objects. Excitingly, the near-perfect agreement of the image with the theoretical predictions shows that Einstein's General Relativity has passed yet another stringent test, and the similarity of the image with that of M87 provides further confidence in our understanding of how a black hole looks and behaves. It was extremely impressive to see how they overcame the daunting technical challenges of imaging a rapidly-varying source, blurred by the effects of the gas lying along our line of sight to the black hole.

The Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration have achieved a quite remarkable feat in imaging the supermassive black hole at the centre of our Milky Way galaxy.

Event horizon telescope milky way black hole