Rule-Breaking Black Hole Growing At 13x the Cosmic 'Speed Limit' Challenges Theories (livescience.com) 20
"A surprisingly ravenous black hole from the dawn of the universe is breaking two big rules," reports Live Science. "It's not only exceeding the 'speed limit' of black hole growth but also generating extreme X-ray and radio wave emissions — two features that are not predicted to coexist..."
"How is this rule-breaking behavior even possible? In a paper published Jan. 21 in The Astrophysical Journal, an international team of researchers observed ID830 in multiple wavelengths to find an answer...." As they attract gas and dust, this material accumulates in a swirling accretion disk. Gravity pulls the material from the disk into the black hole, but the infalling material generates radiation pressure that pushes outward and prevents more stuff from falling in. As a result, black holes are muzzled by a self-regulating process called the Eddington limit... Its X-ray brightness suggests that ID830 is accreting mass at about 13 times the Eddington limit, due to a sudden burst of inflowing gas that may have occurred as ID830 shredded and engulfed a celestial body that wandered too close. "For a supermassive black hole (SMBH) as massive as ID830, this would require not a normal (main-sequence) star, but a more massive giant star or a huge gas cloud," study co-author Sakiko Obuchi, an observational astronomer at Waseda University in Tokyo, told Live Science via email. Such super-Eddington phases may be incredibly brief, as "this transitional phase is expected to last for roughly 300 years," Obuchi added.
ID830 also simultaneously displays radio and X-ray emissions. These two features are not expected to coexist, especially because super-Eddington accretion is thought to suppress such emissions. "This unexpected combination hints at physical mechanisms not yet fully captured by current models of extreme accretion and jet launching," the researchers said in a statement. So while ID830 is launching massive radio jets, its X-ray emissions appear to originate from a structure called a corona, produced as intense magnetic fields from the accretion disk create a thin but turbulent billion-degree cloud of turbocharged particles. These particles orbit the black hole at nearly the speed of light, in what NASA calls "one of the most extreme physical environments in the universe." Altogether, ID830's rule-breaking behaviors suggest that it is in a rare transitional phase of excessive consumption — and excretion. This incredible feeding burst has energized both its jets and its corona, making ID830 shine brightly across multiple wavelengths as it spews out excess radiation.
Additionally, based on UV-brightness analysis, quasars like ID830 may be unexpectedly common, the researchers said. Models predict that only around 10% of quasars have spectacular radio jets, but these energetic objects could be significantly more abundant in the early universe than previously suggested. Most importantly, ID830 also shows how SMBHs can regulate galaxy growth in the early universe. As a black hole gobbles matter at the super-Eddington limit, the energy from its resultant emissions can heat and disperse matter throughout the interstellar medium — the gas between stars — to suppress star formation. As a result, ancient SMBHs like ID830 may have grown massive at the expense of their host galaxies.
"How is this rule-breaking behavior even possible? In a paper published Jan. 21 in The Astrophysical Journal, an international team of researchers observed ID830 in multiple wavelengths to find an answer...." As they attract gas and dust, this material accumulates in a swirling accretion disk. Gravity pulls the material from the disk into the black hole, but the infalling material generates radiation pressure that pushes outward and prevents more stuff from falling in. As a result, black holes are muzzled by a self-regulating process called the Eddington limit... Its X-ray brightness suggests that ID830 is accreting mass at about 13 times the Eddington limit, due to a sudden burst of inflowing gas that may have occurred as ID830 shredded and engulfed a celestial body that wandered too close. "For a supermassive black hole (SMBH) as massive as ID830, this would require not a normal (main-sequence) star, but a more massive giant star or a huge gas cloud," study co-author Sakiko Obuchi, an observational astronomer at Waseda University in Tokyo, told Live Science via email. Such super-Eddington phases may be incredibly brief, as "this transitional phase is expected to last for roughly 300 years," Obuchi added.
ID830 also simultaneously displays radio and X-ray emissions. These two features are not expected to coexist, especially because super-Eddington accretion is thought to suppress such emissions. "This unexpected combination hints at physical mechanisms not yet fully captured by current models of extreme accretion and jet launching," the researchers said in a statement. So while ID830 is launching massive radio jets, its X-ray emissions appear to originate from a structure called a corona, produced as intense magnetic fields from the accretion disk create a thin but turbulent billion-degree cloud of turbocharged particles. These particles orbit the black hole at nearly the speed of light, in what NASA calls "one of the most extreme physical environments in the universe." Altogether, ID830's rule-breaking behaviors suggest that it is in a rare transitional phase of excessive consumption — and excretion. This incredible feeding burst has energized both its jets and its corona, making ID830 shine brightly across multiple wavelengths as it spews out excess radiation.
Additionally, based on UV-brightness analysis, quasars like ID830 may be unexpectedly common, the researchers said. Models predict that only around 10% of quasars have spectacular radio jets, but these energetic objects could be significantly more abundant in the early universe than previously suggested. Most importantly, ID830 also shows how SMBHs can regulate galaxy growth in the early universe. As a black hole gobbles matter at the super-Eddington limit, the energy from its resultant emissions can heat and disperse matter throughout the interstellar medium — the gas between stars — to suppress star formation. As a result, ancient SMBHs like ID830 may have grown massive at the expense of their host galaxies.
Re:C might be flexible. (Score:5, Informative)
This is nothing to do with light speed. It is talking about how quickly mass can fall into a black hole via an accretion disk
No (Score:3)
"Much like the speed of light through a medium varies with the density and optical properties of masses"
Thats due to photons being absorbed and re-emitted.
"perhaps C could also be somewhat "plastic" when traveling through "stretched" spacetime"
Spacetime is altered wherever there is gravity, which is everywhere. If it altered C we'd have measured it by now. It does however alter time.
Re: (Score:2)
Lisa, get in here! (Score:5, Funny)
In this house we obey the laws of physics!
Re:More evidence of fundamental strangeness? (Score:4, Informative)
Am I the only one... (Score:2)
... who read "SMBH" as "Saturday Morning Breakfast Holes"? ;)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Hello, fellow Weiner-enjoyer!
Amazing we got even close to being right ... (Score:2, Interesting)
When things don't behave how we predicted it is still amazing that we got even close. Where does that initial idea come from that ends up as science?
Was a black hole observed and then explained from our existing theory? Something like the atom however, was speculated by the ancient Greeks (?) way before we observed one.
I guess the atom came from an intuition and imagination. Higher order processing, a subconscious, we cant access directly, some can , some can't, certain conditions are better for it.
It would
Re: Amazing we got even close to being right ... (Score:2)
Our predictions for black holes shook out from theories long before we had observations. Those theories had lots of other useful predictions that were confirmed, so it isn't like we just made up the idea of a black hole.
Re: (Score:2)
Doesn't "shook out" really mean the same as we made up with the idea?
If we didn't make it up to some degree, how did it happen?
I hang out with Buddha, he'd probably say we created the right mental conditions for it to appear. Maybe someone immersed in the theories has a late night cheese sandwich and a terrible nightmare about a void swallowing everything, a great metaphor for his death, wakes up in the morning with the idea of a black hole. Who knows?
All science is made up ideas, proved with experiment, ob
Ok, I will be that ackshually guy⦠(Score:2)
â¦Its X-ray brightness suggests that ID830 is accreting mass at about 13 times the Eddington limitâ¦
A telescope is a sort of time machine. It WAS doing this billions of years ago, who knows what itâ(TM)s doing now. That makes it even more mind-blowing.
Re: (Score:2)
I have to wonder if it was eating not one star, but a multiple star system... or a small cluster.
Article Hype (Score:4, Insightful)
"...two big rules". ... "two features that are not predicted to coexist."
Those previous grandiose predictions were wrong. No rules are broken here.
I.e. Imagine mathematicians assert all natural numbers are odd. Then somebody observes an even number. Slashdot article consequently announces "big math rule violated".
Predictions are not science. Science is the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation, experimentation, and the testing of theories against the evidence obtained.
that is an super startgate (Score:2)
that is an super startgate