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Discovery of Hotspots Circling Milky Way Black Hole Has Astronomers Excited
Space.com ^ | November 21, 2018 08:00am ET | Samantha Mathewson,

Posted on 11/21/2018 7:58:43 AM PST by BenLurkin

Broderick's work builds on earlier research by two teams that studied the galactic center of the Milky Way in near-infrared. This included the work of Reinhard Genzel, an astronomer from the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Garching, Germany, as well as researchers Andrea Ghez and Mark Morris of University of California, Los Angeles. At the time, their work revealed that the center of the Milky Way wasn't steady, but instead would drastically brighten about once a day for about 30 or 40 minutes, Broderick said.

Researchers think supermassive black holes exist at the center of most, if not all, large galaxies. Therefore, in 2005, while working alongside researcher Avi Loeb at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Broderick argued that a periodic brightening observed at the heart of the Milky Way, also known as a bright infrared flare, was the result of an incredibly massive object such as a black hole.

This theory was further supported by evidence of a very bright, dense group of stars called a nuclear star cluster that surrounds the central region of the Milky Way. In addition, infrared observations showed that the stars at the very center of the galaxy orbit a dark object estimated to be 4 million solar masses in size, again suggesting the presence of a black hole, Broderick said.

Even still, there was not enough data to prove that a black hole truly exists at the center of the Milky Way, Broderick added — until now.

(Excerpt) Read more at space.com ...


TOPICS: Astronomy; Science
KEYWORDS: astronomy; blackholes; darkenergy; darkforce; darkmatter; milkyway; science; snickers; stringtheory
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1 posted on 11/21/2018 7:58:43 AM PST by BenLurkin
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To: BenLurkin

Galactic warming, no doubt.


2 posted on 11/21/2018 8:01:04 AM PST by Attention Surplus Disorder (Apoplectic is where we want them)
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To: BenLurkin

Stay away from Black Holes with Hot Spots. You’ve been warned.

PS: Stay away from Uranus too.


3 posted on 11/21/2018 8:15:55 AM PST by Az Joe (I AM TRUMP!)
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To: Az Joe

Don’t want to know if there are hot spots around Uranus.


4 posted on 11/21/2018 8:18:24 AM PST by BenLurkin (The above is not a statement of fact. It is either satire or opinion. Or both.)
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To: BenLurkin

Hot spots tend to fade in popularity after a couple of months. I’ll wait.


5 posted on 11/21/2018 8:21:52 AM PST by DannyTN
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To: BenLurkin

“Has Astronomers Excited”

Now we know what those filthy astronomers have been peeking at.


6 posted on 11/21/2018 8:22:45 AM PST by blueunicorn6 ("A crack shot and a good dancer")
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To: Az Joe
Stay away from Black Holes with Hot Spots.

That's no way to talk about the esteemed Representative-elect from New York.

7 posted on 11/21/2018 8:27:36 AM PST by ssaftler (This space for rent.)
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To: BenLurkin

A ‘normal’ black hole orbiting the Central BIG Black Hole, causes the flare?..................


8 posted on 11/21/2018 8:30:03 AM PST by Red Badger (We are headed for a Civil War. It won't be nice like the last one....................)
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To: BenLurkin

Great to know that there is something that astronomers can get excited about.


9 posted on 11/21/2018 8:35:52 AM PST by I want the USA back (It's Ok To Be White. White Lives Matter. White Guilt is Socially Constructed)
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To: Red Badger

Who knows?

That’s what they’re trying to figure out.

I’d say your guess is pretty good, knowing what little we know.

Image the heat, radiation, gravity and just plain density of the stars in the galactic center. It must be enormous!

I would think it could be a place where weird things happen...


10 posted on 11/21/2018 8:38:04 AM PST by Alas Babylon! (Boycott ABC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC and NBC!)
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To: BenLurkin
"Don’t want to know if there are hot spots around Uranus."

Do you post astronomy articles simply as an excuse to stir up 5th-grade FRdumb@$$3ery about the seventh planet?

Joining in with this room-temperature IQ off-coloring reflects poorly upon you -- and on FR.

TXnMA
 

11 posted on 11/21/2018 8:48:28 AM PST by TXnMA (Remember the Alamo! Remember Goliad! REPEAT San Jacinto!!!)
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To: Alas Babylon!

If the orbiting black hole(s) are DIRECTLY in your line of sight, they would produce a brightening, then a dimming, then a brightening again. And would do so in the period of revolution about the center of the galaxy’s Big Black Hole.

Slightly off-center, might produce the brightening only.

From this, the period and the mass could be determined for both the orbiting black hole and the Big Black Hole...............


12 posted on 11/21/2018 8:53:00 AM PST by Red Badger (We are headed for a Civil War. It won't be nice like the last one....................)
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To: BenLurkin

Black Hole Has Astronomers Excited
Should’t that be on the porno rack?.


13 posted on 11/21/2018 8:58:40 AM PST by Vaduz (women and children to be impacIQ of chimpsted the most.)
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To: TXnMA; BenLurkin
On this Thanksgiving Day let us give thanks to those who toil endlessly and thanklessly (yes, there's a reason for that) providing Thread Police services. Volunteers in every sense of the word.

Without whom the phrase " We're better than that," would die of non-use.

Yes, 'thank' you doesn't quite cover it, but it will have to do.

14 posted on 11/21/2018 8:59:34 AM PST by gogeo (The Repubs may not always deserve to win, but the RATs always deserve to lose.)
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To: BenLurkin

Now I feel so ashamed of myself.

What was I thinking?

Poking fun at astronomers.

Shame on me! Shame! Shame!

From now on, I will only write positive things about astronomers here on the gentle pages of Free Republic.

I am positive those astronomers are a bunch of filthy peeping Toms.


15 posted on 11/21/2018 9:01:44 AM PST by blueunicorn6 ("A crack shot and a good dancer")
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To: BenLurkin

I find the study and speculation about black holes to be fascinating - the Science channel often highlights them - there was a new show the other night and it’s neat, that unlike the climate “scientists”, they admit they are still only speculating and cannot be 100% sure they are even real...also having to spread into dark matter to explain what they presume to be the huge ones they think they are detecting....


16 posted on 11/21/2018 9:03:03 AM PST by trebb (Those who don't donate anything tend to be empty gasbags...no-value-added types)
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To: BenLurkin

Discovery of Hotspots Circling Milky Way Black Hole Has Astronomers Excited

Related image
17 posted on 11/21/2018 9:11:23 AM PST by ETL (Obama-Hillary, REAL Russia collusion! Uranium-One Deal, Missile Defense, Iran Deal, Nukes: Click ETL)
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To: BenLurkin

Astronomy threads always bring out the humor.


18 posted on 11/21/2018 9:32:17 AM PST by rdl6989
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To: DannyTN
Hot spots tend to fade in popularity after a couple of months. I’ll wait.

Excellent

19 posted on 11/21/2018 9:46:25 AM PST by Zuben Elgenubi (NOPe to GOPe)
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To: rdl6989

Oh, is that what it’s called? :D


20 posted on 11/21/2018 9:48:24 AM PST by Conan the Librarian (The Best in Life is to crush my enemies, see them driven before me, and the Dewey Decimal System)
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