Black Holes Are Invisible. But Now There Are 3 New Ways to ‘See’ Them

In a world of conspiracy theories and Internet rumors, it’s a wonder no one has ever called black holes a hoax. They’re mysterious, they’re powerful, but—oops!—they’re entirely invisible. Trust us though, they’re there. Most people don’t doubt the truth of black holes, but the invisibility part does rankle astronomers, who prefer things they can see and measure. Well bad news, science folks, black holes aren’t about to pop into view any time soon. But good news: three new developments may make it easier to see what goes on in their immediate vicinity. The reason for the invisibility of black holes is, of course, their gravity. The hyper-compressed remains of collapsed stars, black holes exert so titanic a gravitational force that anything and everything can fall inside them, but nothing—not even light—can escape. Once something does get swallowed by a black hole, all information about what it was—an apple, a pony, Matthew McConaughey—is forever annihilated without a trace. There is no forensic evidence around a black hole. But there are ways around that rule. One of them is known as Hawking radiation, discovered in 1974 by—spoiler alert—Stephen Hawking. According to Hawking, paired particles of matter and antimatter are created around a black hole’s event horizon—the threshold at which matter tumbles into the great gravitational maw and disappears forever. For reasons explain...
Source: TIME.com: Top Science and Health Stories - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized astronomy Black Holes Know Right Now Physics radio telescopes space Source Type: news