For the first time, a black hole was detected directly in a young star cluster

Astronomers have for the first time directly detected the presence of a black hole in a very young galaxy outside our galaxy. According to a study (In English) Released on Thursday, November 11th Monthly announcements From Royal British Astronomical Society. They used a new method that could improve the detection of difficult objects. “There are many black holes in the universe, but we can’t see them because we don’t know them.”, Sarah Saracino, astronomer at the Institute for Astronomical Research at the University of Liverpool (UK) explains.

Their black color simply reflects the fact that these stars are invisible by definition. Their force of gravity, the force that drives humans to the surface of the earth, is so powerful that even light cannot escape. They can be detected indirectly by the radiation emitted at their boundary when they absorb matter or by gravitational waves caused by the fusion of two black holes. But this new study has achieved direct detection when it disrupts the orbit of a star near the black hole.

Using this technique, a team led by Sarah Saracino discovered a black hole with about 11 suns located in NGC 1850, the constellation of the Great Magellanic Cloud, about 160,000 light-years from the Milky Way. This “small” black hole slightly distorts its nearest star, which “weighs” five solar masses. “This is the first time a very young cluster has been found with this technique”, Outside our Milky Way, says the scientist, whose study appears Monthly announcements Of the Royal Astronomical Society.

To find the rare bird, scientists used the Spectrograph MUSE, installed a few years ago on the European Southern Laboratory (ESO)’s largest telescope in Chile. Allowed“Consider the most populous area”According to Sebastian Kamman, co-author of the study Quoted in the ESO press release (In English), “With information about thousands of stars at once, ten times more than other instruments.”. Because the oldest cluster less than 100 million years old is a property of young people “We see very different black holes there, they were created very recently.”, Explains Sarah Saracino. They have no time to contact each other or be evicted, “Like the oldest star clusters”.