12-Billion-Solar-Mass Black Hole Discovered 139
sciencehabit writes: A team of astronomers has discovered what is, in galactic terms, a monstrous baby: a gigantic black hole of 12 billion solar masses in a barely newborn galaxy, just 875 million years after the big bang. It's roughly 3000 times the size of our Milky Way's central black hole. To have grown to such a size in so short a time, it must have been munching matter at close to the maximum physically possible rate for most of its existence. Its large size and rate of consumption also makes it the brightest object in that distant era, and astronomers can use its bright light to study the composition of the early universe: how much of the original hydrogen and helium from the big bang had been forged into heavier elements in the furnaces of stars.
Re:hmmm (Score:5, Informative)
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Black matter, dark matter, dyslexia is awesome...
"Alternately-bright matter" is the preferred nomenclature, Dude.
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Black matter, dark matter, dyslexia is awesome...
"Alternately-bright matter" is the preferred nomenclature, Dude.
Matter of insufficient light?
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The politically correct term is "African-American Matter."
Which reminds me of some ridiculous verbal gymnastics done by some US-based news reporters years back. They were interviewing a black African male as part of a diplomatic entourage from Africa. The knee jerk reaction to say "African American" was so deeply rooted in this news reporter's psyche that she couldn't bring herself to call him "black." Instead, she called him "An African-American from Africa," oblivious to how stupid that sounded.
Even be
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Except black matter is required to explain how stars move within our own galaxy. One would think all those black holes would be spotted effecting light from stars in our galaxy if the cause of the effect was visible. Black matter is a placeholder to make the gravity equations work properly and no one has figured out yet what fills in that placeholder, or (probably less likely) if the equations are just wrong.
"The movement of starts within our galaxy, as explained by Afro-american Matter. " - Drethon. 2015
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How long does it take a baby human to learn the difference between affect and effect?
My guess is they learn that the first time they bite the nipple.
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The equation is based on the complete lunacy that we know exactly how much matter is in the universe.
No equation in astronomy is based on knowing exactly how much matter is in the universe. Virtually every paper on such topics discuss error bars. A large amount of work on such topics deal with upper and lower bounds, explicitly dealing with the inability to know things exactly. There are a lot of realms of science where some value X is not known, but measurements show that X can't be larger than some bound, otherwise they would have caused different observations.
They also admit that there's a thing called the "observable" universe and we have no idea what is past it due to the speed of light vs spatial expansion.
Any universe that has a finite speed of l
Re:hmmm (Score:5, Informative)
A cosmologist's 'dark matter' (non-baryonic) is different than an astrophysicist's 'dark matter' (baryonic). To an astrophysicist, the term 'dark matter' has historically meant matter that is not lit up. It is not reflecting ar emitting light. Also it is not blocking light from some other source. There is nothing exotic or strange about it. It is just in the dark and so it cannot be seen.
There were many observations of matter within the milky way, and within other large spiral galaxies that showed the velocity and orbits of matter were not explained by the mass that could be seen. We only saw mass in the visible light for a long time. The matter had to be emitting light, reflecting light, or blocking another source of light for us to see it in telescopes.
It was simply assumed that Einstein's theories of gravity were still correct and there just had to be more matter than we were seeing. It wasn't seen becuase it was dark, hence the name 'dark matter'. Nothing wierd or strange, just stuff we didn't see.
As time went on our observations expanded into more regions of the electromagnetic spectrum. We saw that there, indeed, was a great deal more matter emitting in the infra-red, radio, x-ray, and gamma ray spectrums. This has added greatly to the amount of matter that is known. There is much less missing mass on the intragalactic scale than there once was because we see more of it.
However, it is not enough. Here is a really good explanation. [uoregon.edu]
And there is a new problem. We are now mapping the interaction of galaxies, and of huge groups of galaxies. And there does not seem to be enough matter in sight to fully account for there movements. Enter the cosmologists.
The first 'exotic' form of 'dark matter' was probably the neutrino. While once considered a very exotic beast, it is now considered rather mundane (at least the three known flavors are considered mundane). The neutrino is an almost massless particle that is electrically neutral and has such a small cross section that it hardly ever interacts with other matter. Neutrinos have mass, so they do feel the effects of gravity and due the the equal and opposite reaction thing, they contribute to the gravity that we, our sun, and all the starts in the galaxy feel. While a single neutrino is almost non-existent, the huge numbers of neutrinos within the boundaries of the galaxy actually do add up to an appreciable mass. [aps.org]
Now cosmologists are suggesting even more exoctic unknown particles, like WIMPS, to explain the missing mass. Some people feel that we should be examining new theories of gravity. Maybe on a very large scale gravity behaves differently. We do know that our theories of gravity are not complete. We do not have a good field theory of gravity that works with quantum mechanics. Continued experimentation involving things like the Higg's Boson will help to confirm some of these leading edge theories, and get rid of others. By determining the mass and energy of the particles that communicate the 'mass' field we will be putting constraints from the real physical universe around these theories.
The cosmology stuff is the wierd exotic 'dark matter' that inspires wierd science fiction ideas, but it will probably be needed to explain all of the missing mass. When some of these, currently, exotic particles are observed measured and fit in an overarching theory, they will seem much more ordinary, as the three known neutrinos are today.
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On a different scale "While a single galaxy is almost non-existent"
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A cosmologist's 'dark matter' (non-baryonic) is different than an astrophysicist's 'dark matter' (baryonic).
While I agree with a lot else you said, the quoted bit above has not been true for over a decade. With the various surveys that placed upper bounds MACHO theories too low to explain non-cosmological things like lensing and rotation curves, even astrophysical dark matter theories have become non-baryonic. There is a lot of normal matter out there still not accounted for, supported even by cosmological models and CMB, that while the main evidence for non-baryonic dark matter, also give normal matter density
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While AC reply has not presented any sort of references that I can read, making it kinda suspect, I less than 3 your reply.
I'm sure no one cares, but I'm on the record. Am I 10 years behind in astronomy science? How the shit would I know?
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It sort of makes me think that dark matter, which doesn't exist and never will
It exists, and will continue to exist, long after all casually arrogant slashdot armchair blowhards have passed into oblivion. :)
Re:hmmm (Score:4, Insightful)
Personally, I think "dark matter" and "dark energy" don't really exist. Instead, I think there's something wrong with our understanding of the fundamental forces of the universe.
That is exactly what Dark Matter is and has always been claimed to be. It is a gap in our knowledge with certain characteristics. We know it is not baryonic matter, we know it is not an issue with gravity, as assume it is matter because matter has mass and mass distorts space(aka gravity). The biggest problem is that Dark Matter is the longest standing unknown in all of history. Through all of recorded history, problems have been solved shortly after the discovery of the problem. Dark Matter is nearly a century old and almost a magnitude worse than any other problem.
Plenty of great minds have looked at the problem. Our only hope is to keep running more tests and for technology to allow our tests to get better.
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we know it is not an issue with gravity
We don't know that with any certainty. Alternative gravity theories are still undergoing active research with various groups dedicated to such work (and are part of mainstream physics, not sidelined or crackpots). That said, no alternative gravity model has had the same success as dark matter theories in terms of explaining multiple observations.
A lot of people shooting from the gut on here and other online sites talk about how it "has to be" or is "obviously" an issue with gravity, but that is going way
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Seriously, we don't even know how quantum stuff or gravity really works. At every point in history physicists think they've attained perfect and complete knowledge and every single time they're wrong. So a bunch of dumbasses stuck on their own planet can't calculate the total energy of the entire universe correctly, it must be magic, not a math error. That makes sense.
Obviously (Score:4, Interesting)
Supermassive black holes have a different origin than stellar black holes
Anyway how big is it now (if it was 12 billion solar masses 12 billion years ago it must be pretty big now. Does this account for the missing dark matter?
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Don't get too excited. 12 billion solar masses doesn't mean much. Billion is 10^9th. The Milky Way's solar mass is about 1.1 10^12th. And the Milky Way isn't that big of a deal on the galactic scale of things.
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Don't let it happen again.
That laissez faire attitude is the source of most parenthetical unnesting in the first place.
Execution is the only solution.
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vive la revolution
(sorry, I couldn't help myself
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Compared to mass of our galaxy (Score:5, Interesting)
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Yeah, well your mom's... well not quite that big. But she big man, she real big.
Sucking in everything around it (Score:5, Funny)
I did not realise that bankers were around as early as 875 million years after the big bang.
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That's not a banker, that enormous black hole is your mom!
Hmm... (Score:2)
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Reading that sentence I thought: "hey, I know where that black hole lives!"
Also it's its, not it's.
It's been named... (Score:2)
Congress.
No real maximum as stated exists (Score:2)
Space expansion inside super-massive black holes. (Score:3, Informative)
My theory is that space expanded differently inside the black hole and that the difference influences our calculations, significantly reducing the needed ingested mass.
Yes, I will mention Slashdot when they give me the Nobel price for that.
Re:Brightest ? (Score:4, Informative)
Light cannot escape the black hole's event horizon. But as matter falls into the black hole, it's heated up tremendously and emits huge amounts of heat, light, and other electromagnetic radiation including X-rays. So it's the matter in the acretion disk being eaten up that emits so much energy.
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Also why we're able to see brown dwarves at all. It's a much lower scale gravitational collapse that will simply leave a frozen, dead Jupiter behind but there's sizable heat content in there (though perhaps augmented by deuterium + tritium fusion early on, and then radioactive decay like in Earth)
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s/So/Dol (Score:3)
12-Billion-Dollar-Mass Black Hole Discovered
Interesting... (Score:2)
So if there is one, either there is a substantial asymmetry or there should be many, following a reasonable distribution curve. If there were many, uniformly distributed, then there should be at least some well inside of the 13 gigaLY sphere (where this one is on the periphery). If there are some inside of this sphere, obviously they stopped "munching stars" and being bright at some point, probably some point before 13 billion years ago. Therefore we can conclude that either:
a) There are an unknown numb
12 Billion?! (Score:1)
Only one salient question... (Score:2)
Is it's event horizon gaining on us?
Great Attractor (Score:2)
How far is it? (Score:2)
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Who reads TFA? But the answer is in TFS: "just 875 million years after the big bang".
"how far away" and "how long ago" are the same thing in astronomy.
Mystery solved (Score:1)
Side effect of all those AOL disks
12 billion solar masses huh? (Score:1)
Are new singularities created around a black hole? (Score:1)
Re:Oh? (Score:4, Insightful)
My thoughts.
If something had to be doing the maximum possible for its entire existence to get that far, chances are that's not the maximum possible, or we're measuring something wrong.
Re:Oh? (Score:5, Funny)
Yea, but it cannot do it for it's whole life without stopping to rest...
Yes it can. As long as it steps on a landmine before getting tired.
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Presumably the statement is less tautological than that. I would assume it means that a new foal is capable of the same speed that any older immature gazelles are capable of, with the possibly that it means they can move as fast as a fully grown gazelle.
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Considering he made the exact same mistake twice in a row, it seems like more than just a one-off typo don't you think?
And your response to someone teasingly pointing this out, is offensive name calling?
What are you, twelve? From the generation where nobody is ever told they're wrong and everybody gets a participation trophy?
Mature adults acknowledge their mistakes and attempt to learn from them. If I was repeatedly making a mistake like this, I would WANT it pointed out to me.
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hence the line in TFA about "challenging current theories"
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Really? Speed of light? Are you denser than a 12 billion solar mass black hole?
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Are you denser than a 12 billion solar mass black hole?
Actually, he is. Unlike regular black holes resulting from supernova collapse, a super-massive black hole is not very dense.
e.g. a one-billion solar-mass (2x10 to 39kg) hole would give a density of 200kg/m3 - less than that of cork!
http://physics.stackexchange.c... [stackexchange.com]
Some have proposed that we may living inside an even bigger black hole.
Re:Oh? (Score:5, Interesting)
"it must have been munching matter at close to the maximum physically possible rate"
That "maximum possible rate" sure sounds like bullshit.
Why does it sound like BS? Given that a huge fraction of the matter spiraling into the black hole is converted into energy before it falls in, that creates an outward pressure that limits how much more matter can follow. So there is a maximum rate that the black hole can accumulate mass.
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If the matter is just "falling in" given the matter's density and distribution being less than 100% of the total possible space I think it's possible that your "maximum possible rate" is an artifact of a static model of a black hole at any given time. I think it's probably impossible that this rate was even approached, really, for any significant time period, certainly not "nearly its entire existence."
The amount of matter that fits in a given space is totally dependent on its pressure and temperature. For the conditions in an accretion disk near the surface of a black hole accumulating at its maximum rate, the space is at 100% of its capacity to hold matter.
Re:Oh? (Score:5, Funny)
"the space is at 100% of its capacity to hold matter" You can say that, but that doesn't make it so.
OK, Einstein. You win. You've conclusively proven that there is indeed nothing limiting how fast a black hole can grow, and you can now collect your Nobel Prize in physics.
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"the space is at 100% of its capacity to hold matter" You can say that, but that doesn't make it so.
OK, Einstein. You win. You've conclusively proven that there is indeed nothing limiting how fast a black hole can grow, and you can now collect your Nobel Prize in physics.
Nope. They need to show their math first. Until they come up with the math, then they need to apply for the Nobel Prize in philosophy, not physics.
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You've found me out! I admit it, I'm a member of a vast conspiracy that's foisting "static observation" on an unsuspecting public.
Re:Oh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Have you ever watched a waterfall?
Ever wonder how all the water doesn't just fall at once?
How about a traffic jam?
While the mechanics behind it are vastly more complex, the end result is quite similar for black holes. There's only so much matter that can transit across the event horizon (a finite surface area) in a given amount of time and if more matter is available it get's blocked up and the excess has to wait.
Re:Oh? (Score:4, Funny)
An AC on slashdot with an on-topic, reasonable and comprehensible explanation...
I think last I've seen that must have been around 1912 or so. Thank you! *sniff*
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STFU you Karma whore! You're a buffoon!
(sorry, but I had to counterbalance that rogue AC's work with an appropriately rude post lest the world come to an abrupt end)
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You didn't even read the article summary at the top of the page, did you?
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Well, one guess is that it could have formed *during* the big bang, and been force-fed at high pressure for a bit. (I'm no cosmologist, in case you couldn't tell, but I *did* warn you it was a guess.) External pressure could do wonders at increasing the rate of feed, and since it would thus grow more rapidly than expected, it would then feed more rapidly than expected when the external pressure was relieved.
Or possibly there was a universe here *before* the big bang, and the nucleus of that black hole pre
Re:Oh? (Score:5, Informative)
There is a maximum rate at which stuff can fall into a black hole, as stuff falls in it compresses and heats up. The more stuff you try to compress at the same time, the hotter it gets, the more black body radiation it emits, to the point that the light emitted would be strong enough to blow away any other stuff in the process of falling in. It is similar in concept to upper limits for the size of stars, where the heat produced at the center of the star will create a light pressure exceeding the gravity holding the star together.
These are not hard boundaries, like the speed of light in relativity. The exact circumstances and external factors can increase or decrease the limit a little, or limits can be exceeded for short periods of time before things setting into some quasi-equilibrium. But there is still a rough limit, and you're not going to see it violated by large amounts unless the theories involved are wrong.
Re:Oh? (Score:5, Interesting)
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Seems like if it is a constant, that it would increase linearly as the blackhole grows in size, allowing more surface area (is that even a correct term to use in such a case?) to gobble up additional stuff. Of course that could become exponential if the growth rate is such.