Like moviegoers on the edges of their seats, astronomers expect this week to finally see a supermassive black hole.
According to calculations, and if all has gone well, either or both of the black holes should appear as a tiny shadow backlit by the glow of radio energy at the galactic center. But he and his colleagues are acting as if they have something to celebrate. The announcement of their results will take place simultaneously in six places around the world, reflecting the vast international nature of the collaboration. One news conference, at the National Press Club in Washington, will be presided over by France Córdova, head of the National Science Foundation. The team members and their friends have booked the National Air and Space Museum for a party that evening.
Einstein disliked that idea, but the consensus today is that the universe is speckled with black holes waiting to vacuum up their surroundings. Many are the gravitational tombstones of stars that have burned up their fuel and collapsed. “Yes, I’m definitely excited to see the image!” Daniel Holz, of the University of Chicago, wrote in an email. “It’s not really rational, since I know the math works and the theory has been thoroughly tested. But still, this would be a picture of the real thing, up close and personal. That is super cool.”
The center of the Milky Way, 26,000 light-years from Earth, coincides with a faint source of radio noise called Sagittarius A* . By tracking the orbits of stars around this hub, astronomers have calculated that whatever sits at the center has the mass of 4 million suns. By combining data from radio telescopes as far apart as the South Pole, France, Chile and Hawaii, using a technique called very long baseline interferometry, Doeleman and his colleagues created a telescope as big as Earth itself.
will they send the liberals there ?