- 4024 - BLACKHOLES - are quasars? The extreme environments of black holes are perfect to test physics to its limit. Blazers are extreme quasars
------------------- 4024 - BLACKHOLES - are quasars?
- Astronomers are
using 100 newly found supermassive black holes as a laboratory for extreme
physics experiments. These black holes
are nicknamed 'blazars' because they are shooting explosive jets of matter and
radiation directly at Earth.
-
- Blazers provide
astronomers with opportunities to study theories of relativity, to better
understand how particles behave at high energies, to study potential sources of
cosmic rays that arrive here on Earth, and to study the evolution and formation
of supermassive black holes and their jets.
-
- Blazars launch
when some of the matter surrounding a supermassive black hole doesn't fall to
its surface, but instead channels to the black hole's poles at speeds
approaching that of light.
-
- Because jet
activity is directly linked to how supermassive black holes gather mass,
unveiling this phenomenon could show how these cosmic titans grow to masses
equivalent to millions or even billions of times that of the sun.
-
- Because the jet
of a blazar is pointed directly at us, we can see them from much farther away
than other black hole systems, similar to how a flashlight appears brightest
when you're looking directly at it.
-
- Astronomers found
the new blazars while looking at unclassified high-energy cosmic emissions with
telescopes. These newly identified blazars are dim in comparison to typical
examples of these powerful cosmic objects, which can often outshine the
combined light from every star in the galaxy that hosts them. The dimmer
blazers allowed the team to test a controversial theory surrounding blazar
emissions, called the 'blazar sequence.'
-
- Blazars emit
light across the entire electromagnetic spectrum, ranging from low-energy light
like radio waves all the way through to extremely energetic gamma rays. The
spectrum of light from blazars tends to peak at two specific wavelengths,
however: in gamma-ray wavelengths, and in a range of lower-energy
wavelengths. The exact wavelength of
these peaks varies from blazar to blazar and can change over time.
-
- With our
currently operating telescopes, it's actually very difficult to detect and
classify the lower-energy peaked — red — blazars that are also dim, whereas it
is much easier to find these blazars when their peaks are at higher energies or
when they are bright.
-
- For each blazar
seen in gamma rays, the astronomers found a counterpart emission in X-rays,
ultraviolet light, or visible light detected by the Neil Gehrels Swift
Observatory. Getting the Swift data from the archive helped the team
characterize the light from 106 new dim blazars.
-
- Blazars launch when
some of the matter surrounding a supermassive black hole doesn't fall to its
surface, but instead channels to the black hole's poles at speeds approaching
that of light. Because jet activity is directly linked to how supermassive
black holes gather mass, unveiling this phenomenon could show how these cosmic
titans grow to masses equivalent to millions or even billions of times that of
the sun.
-
- Blazars emit
light across the entire electromagnetic spectrum, ranging from low-energy light
like radio waves all the way through to extremely energetic gamma rays. The
spectrum of light from blazars tends to peak at two specific wavelengths,
however: in gamma-ray wavelengths, and in a range of lower-energy wavelengths.
The exact wavelength of these peaks varies from blazar to blazar and can change
over time.
-
- The blazar
sequence theory predicts that the lower-energy peak for bright blazars will be
more towards the red (or lower-energy end) of the electromagnetic spectrum than
the same peak for dimmer blazars.
-
- The new work could
also show the strength of a blazar jet's magnetic field, and how fast the
charged particles within it are moving.
It's important to always work to expand our datasets to reach dimmer and
dimmer sources, because it makes theories more complete and less prone to
failures from unexpected biases.
-
May
27, 2023 BLACKHOLES are quasars? 4024
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--------------------- --- Saturday, May 27, 2023
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