From its expansion to acceleration due to dark matter and energy the universe is a vast place
filled with remarkable entities that never cease to amaze even the most brilliant astronomical
minds on the planet the universe conceals dark awful yet amazing secrets within its limitless
reach hello and welcome to Factnomenal in this video we'll uncover some terrifying secrets
the universe holds regarding a particular celestial entity known as the black hole
predicted by Einstein's Theory of Relativity supermassive black holes can have masses equal
to billions of suns and are most likely to be found in the center of a galaxy scientists
don't entirely understand how one originates but in fact these massive and mind-boggling
entities are thought to exist at the center of every single galaxy even the smallest ones
these cosmic bodies devour galactic gas dust and stars, and they can even become heavier than small
galaxies, but there's some good news researchers can now tell when some black holes experience
their largest development spurts by understanding how fast a black hole feeds calculating its mass
and measuring the amount of radiation around it that knowledge in turn can tell them much
about the black hole's history as new images obtained by NASA's James Webb Space Telescope
help scientists understand some of the universe's most powerful forces a separate Dartmouth study is
shedding light on the mystery of supermassive black holes at the rapid growth stage
known as active galactic nuclei or AGN light emitted by these supermassive black holes can
have a variety of colors they can also differ in terms of brightness and spectral signature
astronomers learned in the late 1980s that light signatures from space spanning from radio
wavelengths to x-rays might well be attributed to AGNs it was supposed that the objects were
usually surrounded by a donut-shaped ring of gas and dust known as a torus the various brightnesses
and hues associated with the items were assumed to be caused by the angle from which they were
observed combined with the amount that the Taurus obscured the view as a result a unified theory of
AGNs became widely accepted according to this if a black hole is viewed through its Taurus it should
appear faint and it should appear bright when viewed from below or above the ring the latest
study however calls this concept into question according to the new Dartmouth study the amount of
dust and gas surrounding a supermassive black hole is directly tied to how actively it's growing when
a black hole feeds rapidly the energy pushes dust and gas away as a result it will be less veiled
and appear brighter this discovery gives us some of the most compelling evidence to date that there
are fundamental differences between supermassive black holes with differing light signatures
these changes cannot be explained just by whether the observation is made through or around in AGN's
Taurus this finding supports the idea that Taurus structures encircling black holes are not all
the same, but there is relationship between the structure and how it grows the realization that
the feeding rate not the viewing angle controls the light signatures of supermassive black holes
originates from a decade-long study of neighboring aegeans by an international group leveraging swift
bat a high-energy nasa x-ray telescope scientists have long held many presumptions about the physics
of these objects but now they're aware that heavily concealed black holes have
quite different characteristics from unobscured agn one of the most critical questions to plague
the minds of scientists is how these supermassive black holes form this new study provides an
important component that could assist scientists in determining the answer however their size and
feeding habits aren't the only things that set them apart these super massive black holes have
been theorized to spawn new universes crazy i know especially when we can't even figure out if there
actually are other universes out there a very simplified explanation of how this works is that
our universe today has some incredibly convenient circumstances that came together to develop life
we wouldn't be here if you changed any of these parameters even the slightest tiniest little bit
the singularity said to be at the center of every single black hole violates the basic
laws of physics and in theory has the potential to change these conditions and generate a new
slightly altered universe that being said the idea behind this is still being researched today
yep it just gets crazier and crazier from being an object that can consume planets and stars to
something that creates new universes the craziness just doesn't end well this startling discovery was
made by stephen hawking in the year 1974. the phenomenon is called hawking radiation
and to understand the whole idea behind it we need to understand two things first first a black hole
has an event horizon anything that crosses this line a certain distance from the black hole's
center is sucked into the black hole and never returns second a particle in its anti-particle
can spontaneously form in the darkest vacuum of space for no apparent reason and then
instantly destroy each other vanishing completely and leaving nothing behind it appears as though
energy is taken from the vacuum and then released during the destruction process it's odd that this
seems to be the case but it is so equipped with this information assume you're at a location just
outside the event horizon of a black hole suddenly a particle and its anti-particle
appear out of nowhere but just as they're about to annihilate each other one of them is pulled
into the black hole's event horizon never to return, and the other barely avoids being taken in
and escapes at that time the energy taken from space is not returned this loss of energy
must be compensated for by diminishing the mass of the energy of the black hole by an amount
equal exactly to that of the lucky particle that escaped from it ensuring that everything in the
universe remains perfectly balanced as a result at any sensible distance from the black hole
we see a continuous weak stream of lucky particles leaving from it while the mass of the hole itself
progressively diminishes the escaping particles are known as hawking radiation named after
Stephen Hawking obviously and the black hole's gradual loss of mass is known as evaporation large
star-sized black holes will find plenty to eat to keep growing larger and faster before they
evaporate but for smaller ones evaporation can be quick enough to cause them to vanish completely
and in a relatively short period of time speaking of finding plenty to eat scientists
have discovered a really disturbing habit about black holes table manners
researchers have uncovered how black holes not only swallow stars but also lose a portion
of what they consume yep the massive black hole at the center of the Milky Way galaxy
is a messy eater relax you don't have to get so worked up black holes don't go planet
hunting like hungry predators actually these celestial bodies feed on matter that orbits too
close like one unfortunate star that scientists have been watching being devoured for the last
decade so how on earth do these cosmic spit balls escape a black hole's clutches
the answer is rather simple they're composed of matter that slips from the accretion disk
before passing the point of no return and then solidifies into chunks in the case of Sagittarius
A-star the big pieces it swallows can be spewed into our solar system at a rate of 20 million
miles per hour luckily earth's not in danger of colliding with any known black holes but the fact
that we're not likely to be gobbled up doesn't mean we shouldn't be bothered that's because
these black holes more specifically the supermassive black holes occasionally hurl
off planet-sized spitballs that could be on a path to our dear earth so do you think these
black holes might one day become a problem for us tell us in the comments section below
and as always thanks for watching Factnomenal, and we'll see you next time