Black Hole

According to Einstein’s general theory of relativity, black holes have only three observable properties: mass, spin and charge. Additional properties, or “hair,” do not exist. Andriy_A / Shutterstock Identical twins have nothing on black holes. Twins may grow from the same genetic blueprints, but they can differ in a thousand…

On Christmas Eve, Steven Brandenburg, a Milwaukee-area pharmacist, attempted to destroy more than 500 doses of coronavirus vaccine, because, he admitted, he feared the Moderna drug would “alter the recipient’s DNA.” Described in law-enforcement documents as a “conspiracy theorist,” Brandenburg, 46, had reportedly warned his wife that “the world is…

Home News The European Southern Observatory’s GRAVITY instrument revealed clumps of gas swirling around just outside the supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy. Here, a visualization of that orbiting gas. (Image: © ESO/Gravity Consortium/L. Calçada) The supermassive black hole hiding in the center of our galaxy is…

Almost every galaxy has a supermassive black hole at its heart, with masses of millions to billions of times of the Sun. Since the mass of a central black hole, for the most part, follows the mass of the galaxy itself, astronomers expect the galaxy in the center of Abell…

In a recently shared image by NASA, a galaxy appearing called NGC 6240 contains two supermassive black holes in the process of merging. The image consists of new X-ray data from Chandra (shown in red, orange, and yellow) that has been combined with an optical image from the Hubble Space…

The massive O4.5 V + O5.5 V binary VFTS 352 in the Tarantula Nebula (location indicated by the red cross) is one of the shortest-period and most massive overcontact binaries known. Recent theoretical studies indicate that some of these systems could ultimately lead to the formation of gravitational waves via…

China's Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope (FAST) is the largest and last remaining giant, single-dish telescope after Arecibo's collapse. As China's moon mission advances, experts say the via its resolution and sensitivity, the FAST telescope will help produce critical research over the next decades. Opened in 2016, in November, Chinese state…

Home News Taken with a fish-eye lens, this image shows the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) detector assembly in a tunnel of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). (Image: © VALENTIN FLAURAUD/AFP via Getty Images) The cosmos may be studded with black holes so tiny they could slip in between atoms, a…

At what point, if ever, will Westpac directors actually start doing the job they are remunerated so handsomely to do?Westpac CEO Peter King (Image: AAP/Mick Tsikas)Despite successful efforts at media management by Westpac, this week showed us that the Hayne royal commission left some major problems untouched: the governance and…

Home News Science & Astronomy (Image: © Shutterstock) Black holes are, by far, the most mysterious objects in the universe. They are objects in the cosmos where all of our knowledge of physics completely breaks down. And yet, despite their apparent impossibility, they exist. But what if these gravitational monsters aren't…