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Writer Fuel: Astronomers Find New Invisible Filaments at the Heart of the Milky Way

Radio observations of the Milky Way's center, including hundreds of newly discovered filaments (the smaller, yellowish lines and dots). (Image credit: Farhad Yusef-Zadeh/Northwestern University)

Astronomers have discovered hundreds of strange, stringlike structures at the center of our galaxy, possibly tracing the violent path of an ancient black hole eruption. According to new research published June 2 in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, each of these previously unknown “filaments” measures between 5 and 10 light-years in length — thousands of times … Read more

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Writer Fuel: Will the Whole Universe Eventually Evaporate?

galaxies - deposit photos

Stephen Hawking’s most famous theory about black holes has just been given a sinister update — one that proclaims that everything in the universe is doomed to evaporate. In 1974, Hawking proposed that black holes eventually evaporate by losing what’s now known as Hawking radiation — a gradual draining of energy in the form of … Read more

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Writer Fuel: Astronomers Find Black Hole As Big As 30 Billion Suns

black hole - deposit photos

Astronomers have discovered one of the largest black holes ever found — an ultramassive monster roughly 30 billion times the mass of the sun — using a space-time trick predicted by Albert Einstein. The colossal black hole, which lurks 2.7 billion light-years from Earth in the brightest galaxy of the galaxy cluster Abell 1201, was … Read more

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Writer Fuel: How to Make a Super Massive Black Hole

Triple Quasar Creates Super Massive Black Hole - NASA/ESA

Glimpsed only occasionally at the hearts of massive clusters of galaxies, ultramassive black holes are some of the largest and most elusive objects in the universe. These black hole behemoths have masses exceeding that of 10 billion suns, making them far more monstrous than even the supermassive black holes found at the centers of galaxies … Read more

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Writer Fuel: Runaway Black Hole Trailing newborn Stars Spotted in Intergalactic Space

runaway black hole

Astronomers have spotted a runaway supermassive black hole, seemingly ejected from its home galaxy and racing through space with a chain of stars trailing in its wake. According to the team’s research, which was published April 6 in The Astrophysical Journal Letters (opens in new tab), the discovery offers the first observational evidence that supermassive … Read more

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Writer Fuel: What;s a Buchdahl Star? And Do They Exist?

Black hole - deposit photos

An elusive object in space has posed a riddle for scientists. It looks like a black hole. It acts like a black hole. It may even smell like a black hole. But it has one crucial difference: It has no event horizon, meaning that you can escape its gravitational clutches if you try hard enough. … Read more

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Writer Fuel: Nasa Finds 400 “New” Black Holes, Shrouded By Dust

Black Holes - NASA

Astronomers have uncovered more than 400 previously hidden black holes feeding on stars and dust in the center of galaxies. It appears that many of the new black holes, discovered using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, remained unknown until now because they are buried beneath cocoons of dust. Supermassive black holes, which can be millions of … Read more

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Writer Fuel: Could You Travel Back In Time Via a Black Hole?

wormhole black hole - pixabay

Black holes form natural time machines that allow travel to both the past and the future. But don’t expect to be heading back to visit the dinosaurs any time soon. At present, we don’t have spacecraft that could get us anywhere near a black hole. But, even leaving that small detail aside, attempting to travel into … Read more

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Writer Fuel: Ten Things We Learned About Black Holes in 2022

Black Hole - Deposit Photos

Black holes are scary beasts — objects so massive that not even light can escape their clutches.  In 2022, we learned more about these gravitational monsters than ever before — from the first direct image of the black hole “heart” at the center of the Milky Way to one of the earliest black hole ancestors … Read more

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Writer Fuel: Looking Inside Black Holes

Black hole - deposit photos

Black holes are some of the most enigmatic objects in the universe. This is partially because the equations of general relativity that we use to understand them break down when studying black holes’ ultra-dense centers. However, a new paper shows how astronomers could one day overcome this challenge by using gravitational waves to “see” inside … Read more