Posted on 03/12/2013 7:07:02 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
Explanation: How fast can a black hole spin? If any object made of regular matter spins too fast -- it breaks apart. But a black hole might not be able to break apart -- and its maximum spin rate is really unknown. Theorists usually model rapidly rotating black holes with the Kerr solution to Einstein's General Theory of Relativity, which predicts several amazing and unusual things. Perhaps its most easily testable prediction, though, is that matter entering a maximally rotating black hole should be last seen orbiting at near the speed of light, as seen from far away. This prediction was tested recently by NASA's NuSTAR and ESA's XMM satellites by observing the supermassive black hole at the center of spiral galaxy NGC 1365. The near light-speed limit was confirmed by measuring the heating and spectral line broadening of nuclear emissions at the inner edge of the surrounding accretion disk. Pictured above is an artist's illustration depicting an accretion disk of normal matter swirling around a black hole, with a jet emanating from the top. Since matter randomly falling into the black holee should not spin up a black hole this much, the NuSTAR and XMM measurements also validate the existence of the surrounding accretion disk.
(Excerpt) Read more at 129.164.179.22 ...
[Illustration Credit: Robert Hurt, NASA/JPL-Caltech]
Pretty fast.
Note, this is an illustration/artist's conception, thanks for reading this note.
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noted
Wow, I really worded that clumsily. Clumsily? Wow, that doesn’t look right either.
Time for bed...
If you want to know how fast a black a-hole can spin, you could take measurements at the next Obama press conference.
...where’s a photon torpedo when ya need one???...danged black holes...
Oh, dear. That is shocking! As if no one would notice? Lord have mercy.
clumsily
go clumb into bed silly
Nice APOD Mr. Civilizations, and a beautiful artist’s rendering of what one might expect to see while too close to a black hole to escape its gravity.
I wish the larger version at the APoD website were a bit larger than it is.
Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Spin up of a Ultramassive Black Hole
What happens when a White Hole tries to merge with a Black Hole.
Mooshell?
Wow!
You can’t zoom in using your mouse? I have a Marathon Mouse, and Ctrl-mouse wheel forward makes everything bigger. Also, on the computer, Ctrl-+ does the same thing.
To get back to normal in either case, Ctrl-0. And I wish we could control zer0.
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