US, WASHINGTON (ORDO NEWS) — A group of astronomers from the European Southern Observatory (ESO) and several other institutes discovered a black hole closest to the solar system. This is stated in a message published May 6 in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.
A black hole is located a thousand light-years from Earth and enters the system of stars visible with the naked eye. Initially, scientists tracked the HR6819 system as part of the study of binary stellar systems. During the analysis, they revealed a third body in this system, which turned out to be a black hole.
“Observations with the FEROS spectrograph at the 2.2-meter MPG / ESO telescope in La Silla showed that one of the two visible stars revolves around an invisible body in 40 days, and the second is at a great distance from this inner pair,” the statement said.
ESO noted that the system located in the constellation of the Telescope is so close to the Earth that its stars can be viewed without binoculars or a telescope in a cloudless sky in the southern hemisphere. The observatory noted that at the moment, scientists have discovered only a couple dozen black holes in the galaxy that actively interact with the environment. Opening a “sleeping” black hole gives clues about where other black holes might be hidden.
In addition, the discovery of such triple systems with an inner pair and a third star at a distance can also shed light on the merging of stars, which are accompanied by the release of gravitational waves, powerful enough to register on Earth.
Earlier, on May 4, Canadian scientists from the CITE project recorded a fast radio burst (FRB) that occurred in our galaxy. Radio burst occurred from the magnetar SGR 1935 + 2154. This is a type of neutron star with a powerful field.
—
Online:
Contact us: [email protected]
Our Standards, Terms of Use: Standard Terms And Conditions.