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Black Holes
Black holes are the evolutionary endpoints of stars at least 10 to 15 times as massive as the Sun. If a star that massive or larger undergoes a supernova explosion, it may leave behind a fairly massive burned out stellar remnant. With no outward forces to oppose gravitational forces, the remnant will collapse in on itself to the point of zero volume and infinite density, creating what is known as a singularity. As the density increases, the path of light rays emitted from the star are bent and eventually wrapped irrevocably around the star. Any emitted photons are trapped into an orbit by the intense gravitational field; they will never leave it. Because no light escapes after the star reaches this infinite density, it is called a black hole. But contrary to popular myth, a black hole is not a cosmic vacuum cleaner. If our Sun was suddenly replaced with a black hole of the same mass, the earth's orbit around the Sun would be unchanged.
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Featured News
Is Our Universe at Home Within a Larger...
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. (April 5, 2010) – Could our universe be located within the interior of a wormhole which itself is part of a black hole that lies within a much larger... More »
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Featured News
Black Hole Hunters Set New Distance Record
GARCHING, GERMANY (Jan. 28, 2010) – Astronomers using ESO’s Very Large Telescope have detected, in another galaxy, a stellar-mass black hole much farther away than any... More »
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Featured News
Newborn Black Holes May Add Power to Many...
WASHINGTON, DC (Jan. 27, 2010) – Astronomers studying two exploding stars, or supernovae, have found evidence the blasts received an extra boost from newborn black holes.... More »
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Featured News
Suzaku Catches Retreat of a Black Hole's Disk
GREENBELT, MD (Dec. 8, 2009) – Studies of one of the galaxy's most active black-hole binaries reveal a dramatic change that will help scientists better understand how... More »
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Featured News
Fermi Telescope Peers Deep into Microquasar
GREENBELT, MD (Dec. 1, 2009) – NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope has made the first unambiguous detection of high-energy gamma-rays from an enigmatic binary system... More »
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Featured News
Black hole zapping a galaxy into existence
GARCHING, GERMANY (Nov. 30, 2009) – Which comes first, the supermassive black holes that frantically devour matter or the enormous galaxies where they reside? A brand new... More »
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Featured News
First Black Holes May Have Incubated in Giant,...
BOULDER, CO (Nov. 23, 2009) – The first large black holes in the universe likely formed and grew deep inside gigantic, starlike cocoons that smothered their powerful x-ray... More »
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Featured News
Sophisticated telescope camera debuts with...
University of Florida (Sep. 15, 2009) — Less than two months after they inaugurated the world’s largest telescope, University of Florida astronomers have used one of the... More »
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Featured News
Researchers propose new way to reproduce a...
Dartmouth College (Aug. 22, 2009) – Despite their popularity in the science fiction genre, there is much to be learned about black holes, the mysterious regions in space... More »
Is Our Universe at Home Within a Larger Universe?
Last Updated on 2010-04-28 at 22:15
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. (April 5, 2010) – Could our universe be located within the interior of a wormhole which itself is part of a black hole that lies within a much larger... More »
Black Hole Hunters Set New Distance Record
Last Updated on 2010-01-28 at 16:15
GARCHING, GERMANY (Jan. 28, 2010) – Astronomers using ESO’s Very Large Telescope have detected, in another galaxy, a stellar-mass black hole much farther away than any... More »
Newborn Black Holes May Add Power to Many Exploding...
Last Updated on 2010-01-27 at 16:08
WASHINGTON, DC (Jan. 27, 2010) – Astronomers studying two exploding stars, or supernovae, have found evidence the blasts received an extra boost from newborn black holes.... More »
Suzaku Catches Retreat of a Black Hole's Disk
Last Updated on 2009-12-10 at 11:26
GREENBELT, MD (Dec. 8, 2009) – Studies of one of the galaxy's most active black-hole binaries reveal a dramatic change that will help scientists better understand how... More »
Black Hole Confirmed
Last Updated on 2009-12-02 at 09:54
In 1967, an X-ray sounding rocket discovered a fantastically bright source of X-ray emission coming from the direction of the constellation of Cygnus. Named Cyg X-3, it was soon... More »
Fermi Telescope Peers Deep into Microquasar
Last Updated on 2009-12-01 at 11:07
GREENBELT, MD (Dec. 1, 2009) – NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope has made the first unambiguous detection of high-energy gamma-rays from an enigmatic binary system... More »
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