Star tracked as it orbits the Milky Way's black hole

Star tracked as it orbits the Milky Way's black hole

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Added on Wednesday 10 December 2008 12:06:06
by newscientistvideo
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http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn16247?DCMP=youtube

Over a period of 16 years, astronomers tracked stars as they orbited the Milky Way's central region, which is thought to harbour a colossal black hole. One star, called S2, was observed over its complete 15.8-year-long orbit. The star approached the black hole to within one light day, which is only about five times the distance between Neptune and the Sun. (Courtesy of ESO)

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Deathpod4

@4d616c65737469636b Thanks for your comment. I had to look back what I'd said as it was 2 years ago. I should have said that they gain mass, not get bigger, but it seems who ever I was talking too had no idea about cosmology anyway so you rather late game of semantics is futile. Perhaps you'd like me to send you some of my 1970's school homework so you can critique that as well.
Wednesday 04 January 2012 07:57:57
4d616c65737469636b

@Deathpod4 It's not the black hole it self growing It's the event horizon.
Tuesday 03 January 2012 20:18:18
nonohino

@sighhhhhhhhhhhhhhh The Void, eh?
Tuesday 07 June 2011 08:30:03
NarowAR07

am i the only one expecting porn from the title ?
Wednesday 25 May 2011 13:03:09
taepodong1101

@waterdamnaged andromeda is BIGGER with more stars (1trillion) compared to 100 billion for Milky way. Milkyway is more MASSIVE as there is (supposedly) more dark matter.
Monday 17 January 2011 07:24:02
TehKazangsta

@ClitoriousCeasar agreed. :D
Thursday 11 November 2010 23:59:39
ClitoriousCeasar

@TehKazangsta lol.. the funniest think is that there are documentaries that try to estimate the fate of our solar system and earth after the collision. like our solar system will even exist by then.. most probably there will be a red giant with only jupiter-saturn-uranus-neptune still around (and there is a very likely possibility that one of uranus-neptune will be gone rogue much earlier). :)
Thursday 11 November 2010 02:34:26
KONERKOSLAM14

Zairuku, i agree, especially at this rate we driving ourselvea back to stoneage and a catastrophic natural cataclysm hasnt even happened yet.
Wednesday 10 November 2010 02:48:39
rotagen5

How much fuel would it take to send our government "leaders" directly to this centre, and eject them naked into the hole, anyone know? I'm willing to pay more taxes to this end.
Monday 20 September 2010 13:18:53
xandju

there's a black hole in the middle of the milkyway. our galaxy. the star you see the whipps around the bottom of it? 11mil miles/hr as it whips around lol.
Monday 21 June 2010 21:21:36
cruppted

@ThexMetalxWithin thinking we came from apes is a common misconception
Wednesday 12 May 2010 03:32:38
elantriv

google Doe's Account, mindblowing
Sunday 18 April 2010 11:54:44
julzeatspu

only an un-evolved monkey would say that
Tuesday 02 March 2010 06:08:44
ThexMetalxWithin

why do people even pretend that they can understand science like this? a thousand years from now we'll think wow they were dumbasses that thought they knew about black holes and belived we came from apes!
Monday 08 February 2010 17:30:00
zairuku

Although your time scale isnt accurate...but yes...we are on a collision course with Andromeda (sp) not in our life time, and probably not in our species time...
Saturday 30 January 2010 17:01:47
TehKazangsta

@illumse yea andromeda and the milky way will prolly collide at some point. but would it really make a difference to us? our sun will have burned earth to a crisp by then anyway. :D
Wednesday 16 December 2009 19:15:51
edashiba

Ah, I see what you mean
Tuesday 08 December 2009 18:03:54
ananiasacts

Infinite density doesn't require a lot of mass, any amount will do. Any amount of mass squeezed into a zero volume will result in a black hole as I understand it. It's just that the smaller the hole, the faster its sharply curved event horizon will tend to separate virtual particles from their partners and cause its mass to evaporate.
Tuesday 08 December 2009 10:50:17
edashiba

in order to have a black hole, you need immense amounts of mass, and infinite density.
Tuesday 08 December 2009 00:51:09
illumse

i have heard that in 198,375,273,193.5 years 2 galexys will colide and we will all die so all the planets will dicenagrate too.
Saturday 07 November 2009 13:20:17
sireduardo420

Hawking postulated how black holes 'evaporate' back into space via particle/anti-particle eruptions (quantum foam). More importantly, anti-matter (such as a positron) still has a positive mass so dropping a positron into a BH will increase the BH's mass.
Tuesday 27 October 2009 02:48:31
Sk8erfv523

light cant even escape black holes,, simply mind blowing
Sunday 20 September 2009 06:47:07
clnmyjts

Your question is a good one, if you find out let me know.. I seen a video on the Andromeda Galaxy`s black hole on a youtube video.. I was wondering if it was for real or just speculation.. The more we know about our solar system and the galaxy the better we understand our planet...
Sunday 12 July 2009 15:08:13
Mathview

Partial Answer: ESO Very Large Telescope has an IR detector for the 2micron band. The telescopes can be linked together as an interferometer. The system has a resolution of 1 milli-arcsecond. That would make distance individual stars resolvable. So it seems the galactic core region is observable using the IR band at the VLT.
Sunday 05 July 2009 01:29:52