'We're excited because we can get these details about what the debris is doing. This is really unfortunate because there's a lot of information that you can get from the ultraviolet spectra,' said Emily Engelthaler of the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian (CfA) in Cambridge, Massachusetts. 'However, there are still very few tidal events that are observed in ultraviolet light given the observing time. Unlike Hubble observations, data was collected in X-ray light from an extremely hot corona around the black hole that formed after the star was already torn apart. NASA recently reported that several of its high-energy space observatories spotted another black hole tidal disruption event on March 1, 2021, and it happened in another galaxy. The spectroscopy provides forensic clues to the black hole homicide.Ībout 100 tidal disruption events around black holes have been detected by astronomers using various telescopes. But astronomers used Hubble's powerful ultraviolet sensitivity to study the light from the shredded star, which include hydrogen, carbon, and more. Hubble can't photograph the AT2022dsb tidal event's mayhem up close, since the munched-up star is nearly 300 million light-years away at the core of the galaxy ESO 583-G004.

Astronomers are using Hubble to find out the details of what happens when a wayward star plunges into the gravitational abyss. In other words, black holes are messy eaters. There is a balance between the black hole's gravity pulling in star stuff, and radiation blowing material out. These are termed 'tidal disruption events.' But the wording belies the complex, raw violence of a black hole encounter. When the star gets close enough, the black hole's gravitational grasp violently rips it apart and sloppily devours its gasses while belching out intense radiation.Īstronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have recorded a star's final moments in detail as it gets gobbled up by a black hole. They lie in wait until a hapless star wanders by. About 100 insatiable black holes have been observed to date.īlack holes are gatherers, not hunters. This process formed a donut-shaped ring of gas around the black hole with superheated gas bleeding out in every direction. It was shredded, and pulled toward the black hole like a piece of stretched taffy. These spectra tell a forensic story of a star falling into a cosmic blender. Instead, Hubble astronomers took the fingerprints of starlight coming from the mishap. Hubble is too far away to see the doomed star getting sucked in. Like a police officer arriving quickly at the scene of an accident, Hubble vision was trained on the mayhem before the collision was over. Hubble astronomers got a front row seat to such an interstellar demolition derby when they were alerted to a flash of high-energy radiation from the core of a galaxy 300 million light-years away. But entire stars can face that peril if they wind up in the wrong place at the wrong time. That’s no worry for astronauts who have yet to travel farther than the Moon. There’s no escape if you happen to stumble across one in the inky blackness of space. This makes them hungry monsters lurking in the eternal darkness. Four Successful Women Behind the Hubble Space Telescope's Achievementsīlack holes have such a voracious gravitational pull that they even swallow light.Characterizing Planets Around Other Stars.Measuring the Universe's Expansion Rate.

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