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| The largest observed black hole to date is 10,000 times larger than the one at the heart of the Milky Way |
First, astronomers reported that they found the largest black hole to date.
Next, they observed the supermassive black hole closest to Earth glowing with "unprecedented brightness." Why? They're not sure.
The glowing black hole is known as Sagittarius A* (or Sgr A*). It is 4 million times as massive as the Sun and about 26,000 light-years from Earth. Think about that. Can you grasp that size? I can't and I doubt that you can either.
No visible light can escape the gravitational pull of a black hole, but on one night of observation it showed a brightness about twice as bright as the brightest measurement in the past 20 years.
In a wonderful understatement, Tuan Do, an associate research scientist and deputy director of the galactic center group at UCLA, who led the study, said "That indicates that perhaps something interesting is happening physically in the region of the black hole."
Interesting indeed.
Here's a timelapse of images over 2.5 hr from May from @keckobservatory of the supermassive black hole Sgr A*. The black hole is always variable, but this was the brightest we've seen in the infrared so far. It was probably even brighter before we started observing that night! pic.twitter.com/MwXioZ7twV— Tuan Do (@quantumpenguin) August 11, 2019
Potential explanation: A star called SO-2 and another object called G2 got very close to Sgr A* in recent years, which could've ejected gas into the region that the black hole absorbed potentially causing the recent fireworks.
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