Staring at a small patch of sky for more than 50 hours with the ultra-sensitive Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA), astronomers have for the first time identified discrete sources that account for nearly all the radio waves coming from distant galaxies. They found that about 63 percent of the background radio emission [continue reading]
Lurking at the centers of most galaxies are supermassive black holes that can weigh anywhere from one million to one billion times as much as the Sun. New research, published today in the Astrophysical Journal, shows that these black holes are growing at much larger rates than had previously been thought possible. Even the black hole [continue reading]
In a letter to Nature, an international team of astronomers, including Marc Sarzi from the University of Hertfordshire, report the exciting discovery of a new way to measure the mass of supermassive black holes in galaxies. By measuring the speed with which carbon monoxide molecules orbit around such black holes, this new research opens [continue reading]
Sighting may help improve understanding of the early Universe Scientists in Australia believe they’ve identified a quasar in the process of lighting up, for the very first time. This discovery could help scientists answer lingering questions about how these exceptionally bright celestial bodies form, and how they helped the ancient Universe shape today’s galaxies. [continue reading]
Astronomers from Swinburne University of Technology have discovered how supermassive black holes grow – and it’s not what was expected. A black hole in a star cluster. Image Credit: Gabriel Perez Diaz For years, scientists had believed that supermassive black holes, located at the centers of galaxies, increased their mass in step with the growth of their [continue reading]
Very sensitive, wide-field observations with a worldwide network of radio telescopes have uncovered supermassive black holes residing in the center of dust obscured galaxies. In some cases, the amount of dust is so large that even x-rays from the accreting black holes are absorbed in these systems. This is the result of research done by astronomers [continue reading]