Podcaster: Richard Drumm
Title: Space Scoop: Megaflares Shed Light On Our Black Hole
Organization: Astrosphere New Media
Link : astrosphere.org ; http://unawe.org/kids/unawe1505/
Description: Space scoop, news for children.
Bio: Richard Drumm is President of the Charlottesville Astronomical Society and President of 3D – Drumm Digital Design, a video production company with clients such as Kodak, Xerox and GlaxoSmithKline Pharmaceuticals. He was an observer with the UVa Parallax Program at McCormick Observatory in 1981 & 1982. He has found that his greatest passion in life is public outreach astronomy and he pursues it at every opportunity.
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Transcript:
This is 365 Days of Astronomy. Today we bring you a new episode in our Space Scoop series. This show is produced in collaboration with Universe Awareness, a program that strives to inspire every child with our wonderful cosmos.
Today’s story is…
Megaflares Shed Light On Our Black Hole
Our Galaxy is shaped like a whirlpool, with long strips of cosmic gas and dust swirling around the centre. And like a whirlpool, objects that come too close are dragged into the centre never to be seen again.
The fate of these unfortunate objects is no mystery. Lurking in the dark at the heart of our Galaxy is gigantic, hungry monster – a supermassive black hole or SMBH. And it’s dark when that monster isn’t eating. But when it IS…
Supermassive black holes are famous for their ability to swallow anything – even light! But they don’t just eat; they sometimes spit too! Yes, SMBHs are messy eaters!
In late 2013, an outburst (what we astronomers call a flare) was spotted blasting from the center of our Galaxy. Like many flares, it was made up of high-energy X-rays. However, this particular outburst was 400 times brighter than the X-ray output normally seen coming from our SMBH!
A little more than a year later, it let off another flare, this time it was half as bright, 200 times brighter than usual. Astronomers have two theories about what could be causing these so-called “megaflares”.
The first idea is that the black hole’s strong gravity tore apart an asteroid that strayed too close. The debris was then heated to millions of degrees before being devoured, emitting X-rays in the process.
The other possible explanation involves the strong magnetic fields around the black hole. If these magnetic fields wobbled somehow, its magnetic field lines disconnecting and reconnecting, it could cause a large burst of X-rays. In fact, such events are seen regularly on our own Sun, we call them solar flares.
The picture in this episode’s album artwork shows the area around the supermassive black hole at the centre of our Galaxy, called Sagittarius A* (or Sag A* for short). It’s a picture taken by the X-ray detecting Chandra Space Telescope during that giant flare in 2013.
Hey, Here’s a Cool FactSagittarius A* is about 4.5 million times more massive then our Sun!
Thank you for listening to 365 Days of Astronomy!
End of podcast:
365 Days of Astronomy
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