When scientists unveiled humanity’s historic first image of a black hole in 2019 – depicting a dark core encircled by a fiery aura of material falling toward it – they believed even richer imagery and insights were waiting to be teased out of the data.
When scientists unveiled humanity’s historic first image of a black hole in 2019 – depicting a dark core encircled by a fiery aura of material falling toward it – they believed even richer imagery and insights were waiting to be teased out of the data.
Simulations predicted that, hidden behind the glare of the diffuse orange glow, there should be a thin, bright ring of light created by photons flung around the back of the black hole by its intense gravity.
A team of researchers led by astrophysicist Avery Broderick used sophisticated imaging algorithms to essentially “remaster” the original imagery of the supermassive black hole at the centre of the Messier 87 (M87) galaxy.
“We turned off the searchlight to see the fireflies,” said Broderick, an associate faculty member at Perimeter Institute and the University of Waterloo. “We have been able to do something profound – to resolve a fundamental signature of gravity around a black hole.”
Read more at University of Waterloo
