An astrophysicist warns of an unprecedented supermassive black hole: “We’ve never seen this”
Researchers have observed strange goings-on around a supermassive black hole located nearly 300 million light years away.
Modern telescopes have revolutionized our view of the cosmos, providing clearer images of distant galaxies.
Recently, astronomers focused on a galaxy 270 million light years away, which hosts a supermassive black hole known as 1ES 1927+654. The black hole, researchers have now observed, has been emitting X-ray flashes at an increasing rate - behavior not previously witnessed.
“Nothing like a normal supermassive black hole”
In 2022, the European Space Agency’s XMM-Newton X-ray space telescope recorded flashes every 18 minutes. Since then, these intervals have shortened significantly, with flashes increasing in frequency to every seven minutes.
“We’ve never seen this dramatic variability in the rate at which it’s flashing,” says the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) astrophysicist Megan Masterson, who is among a team of scientists who have been investigating the unexpected phenomenon. “This looked absolutely nothing like a normal supermassive black hole.”
What is causing the accelerating X-ray flashes?
In an interview published by MIT in January, Masterson explained that these accelerating X-ray flashes are potentially being caused by the presence of a white dwarf - the core of a burnt-out star - in the black hole’s orbit.
It is thought that the star may be orbiting close to the supermassive black hole’s event horizon - the ‘point of no return’ at which objects can no longer break free from a black hole’s gravitational pull - without actually being sucked in. “This would be the closest thing we know of around any black hole,” Masterson said. “This tells us that objects like white dwarfs may be able to live very close to an event horizon for a relatively extended period of time.”
X-ray flashes from a nearby supermassive black hole accelerate mysteriously https://t.co/R48FMFPsPr @ScienceMIT
— MIT Physics (@MIT_Physics) January 13, 2025
Scientists embrace next-gen tech to gain further insight
Masterson notes that there could also be other factors behind the accelerating flashes. With more observations needed, her co-researcher, the MIT physics professor Erin Kara, is hopeful that the next generation of gravitational wave detectors will help to provide more answers.
If a white dwarf is behind the phenomenon, Kara explained on the MIT website, the dead star will emit gravitational waves. “These new [gravitational wave] detectors are designed to detect oscillations on the scale of minutes, so this black hole system is in that sweet spot,” Kara said.
The research team was to present its findings at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Maryland in January, and this week published the results of its study in the prestigious scientific journal Nature.
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Article originally written in Spanish, before being translated with the assistance of AI, and edited and expanded by William Allen.
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