Supermassive Black Hole Photographed For The First Time

At the heart of every galaxy is a supermassive black hole, a place where everything, including light, can be devoured to the point of no return. For years, scientists went to great lengths to photograph one of these deadly masses, but to no avail, as the absence of light makes them almost invisible. This April 10, for the first time, a first snapshot of a supermassive black hole should be unveiled to the public. A group of scientists from the international Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) project, drawing on data from the global network of telescopes spread across the planet, began collecting information on black holes in 2006. The snapshot, which is to be unveiled on April 10, is the result of two years of observation.

First snapshot of a supermassive black hole to be unveiled on April 10

The snapshot to be discovered on April 10 will show one of the two supermassive black holes, Sagittarius A * or M87, respectively from our Milky Way galaxy or from the neighboring galaxy, Virgo A. As for the gigantic black hole SagittariusA *, it would be 4 million times more massive than the Sun and would be located about 26,000 light years from Earth. The M87, on the other hand, is said to be 3.5 billion times more massive than the Sun and is located about 53 million light years from Earth.

Thanks to radio telescopes spread all over the planet, scientists have been able to achieve record resolution, capable of photographing the central supermassive black hole of our Milky Way, the Sagittarius A *, or the gigantic black hole which is located at the center of the large elliptical galaxy. the M87. In fact, what we expect to see is rather a dark silhouette not emitting light by itself, but blocking in a very precise way the light rays, which come from the hot accretion disk. surrounding these stars.