For the first time in history, astronomers have received a direct image of two black holes orbiting each other. This was the first visual confirmation of the existence of pairs of black holes. An image of the double black hole OJ287 was taken using a network of radio telescopes, reports Live Science.
The objects are located about 5 billion light years from Earth in the center of a distant galaxy and move in a common orbit with a period of 12 years. Black holes form after the death of massive stars and grow over time, absorbing surrounding gas, stars and other black holes. Those of them, located in the centers of galaxies, have a mass that exceeds that of the Sun by millions and billions of times.
During active absorption, a disc of red-hot plasma is formed around them. Part of the matter falls inside the black hole, and part is ejected into space at almost the speed of light in the form of relativistic jets. Thanks to the emission of these jets and the glow of the gas, such objects become visible for observation. Active black holes in the centers of galaxies sometimes form quasars — ultra-bright nuclei that often block the light of stars in the galaxy. OJ287 is just such a quasar.
Until now, scientists have managed to directly photograph only two single black holes: Sagittarius A at the center of the Milky Way and M87 at the center of the M87 galaxy. Now, with the help of radio telescopes, the first picture of a double black hole was obtained, confirming the assumption that the quasar OJ287 consists of two objects.
The system’s smaller black hole has a mass about 100 million times that of the Sun, while the larger one has a mass of about 18 billion solar masses. Both emit powerful jets, and it is thanks to this emission and the light of the gas surrounding them that astronomers managed to capture a direct image of this pair.
