Science

SCIENCE EDITORS:

Eloise Shewring

Livvy Mason-Myhill

Hubble's hunt for an intermediate-mass black hole

Livvy Mason-Myhill, Editor-in-Chief, tells us about evidence of an intermidiate-mass black hole, through researchers' use of the Hubble Space Telescope

IN Messier 4, the nearest globular cluster to Earth, researchers using the Hubble Space Telescope have discovered evidence for an intermediate-mass black hole. The closest globular star cluster to Earth, Messier 4, is located anywhere between 6,000 and 7,200 light-years away. Astronomers have discovered strong evidence for the existence of a unique type of intermediate-mass black holes that may be hiding there.

sun. Meanwhile, the entire cosmos is flooded with supermassive black holes. These enormous objects, which reside at the galactic centres, are millions or billions of times heavier than our sun.

The intermediate-mass black hole, however, has long been a sought-after missing piece by scientists. The mass of these black holes would range from 100 to 100,000 solar masses.

the velocity of stars that are drawn into its gravitational field, similar to bees swarming around a hive, the scientists can determine its mass. It takes time and great care to precisely measure their motion. This is where Hubble excels over all other modern telescopes. Hubble M4 observations spanning 12 years were analysed by astronomers to resolve pinpoint stars.

Black holes resemble powerful gravitational gouges in space, and they all appear to come in two sizes: small and enormous. Our galaxy is thought to contain 100 million tiny black holes, according to scientists. These tiny black holes, formed when stars erupted, are several times as massive as the

Hubble has now been utilised by scientists to focus on the centre of the globular star cluster Messier 4 (M4). With more accuracy than was previously conceivable, they are searching for black holes. The principal author of a study that will appear in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society is Eduardo Vitral of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland.

A potential black hole with an intermediate mass of about 800 solar masses has been found by Vitral's team. There is no sign of the alleged object. However, by observing

This is where Hubble excels over all other modern telescopes

According to the team, the M4 black hole might have an estimated mass of up to 800 times that of the sun. Hubble's results tend to disprove competing hypotheses about this item. According to some of these hypotheses, the universe may consist of a compact centre cluster of neutron stars or smaller black holes whirling around one another as unresolved stellar remains.