H1821+643: NASA’s Chandra identifies low-power black hole

Astronomers have discovered that rapidly growing supermassive black holes (quasars) are not behaving as expected. Quasars are rapidly growing supermassive black holes that suck in matter at very high speeds. H1821+643 is the closest quasar to Earth, located in a galaxy cluster approximately 3.4 billion light years away. Using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and VLA, researchers found that H1821+643 is less influential than many supermassive black holes in other star clusters. This image shows a quasar, a rapidly growing supermassive black hole that, as reported in the latest press release, is not producing as much as astronomers hope. Data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory (blue) and radio data from the NSF Karl G. Jansky X-ray Observatory (red) reveal some evidence that this quasar is having a disappointing impact on its host galaxy. I’m doing it. This quasar, known as H1821+643, is approximately 3.4 billion light-years from Earth. Quasars are a rare and extreme class of supermassive black holes that violently pull matter inward, producing powerful radiation and sometimes powerful jets. H1821+643 is the closest quasar to Earth in the galaxy cluster. Quasars differ from other supermassive black holes at the centers of galaxy clusters in that they attract more matter at faster speeds. Astronomers have discovered that non-quasar black holes that grow at a moderate rate affect their surroundings by preventing the hot gas between galaxies from cooling too much. This controls the growth of stars around the black hole. However, the influence of quasars is not well known. This new study on H1821+643 shows that quasars, although highly active, may not be as important to the fate of their host galaxies and galaxy clusters as some scientists expect. is showing. To reach this conclusion, the research team used Chandra to study the hot gas that blankets H1821+643 and its parent galaxy. But the bright X-rays of quasars have made it difficult to study weaker X-rays from hot gases. The researchers carefully removed the X-ray glare to reveal the black hole’s effects. The effect is reflected in a new composite image showing X-rays from hot gas in the cluster around the quasar. This shows that quasars actually have little effect on their surroundings. Using Chandra, the researchers found that the gas density near the black hole at the center of the galaxy is much higher than in more distant regions, and the gas temperature is much cooler. Scientists believe that when little or no energy is added, which is typically the case when a black hole erupts, hot gas cools and flows toward the center of a star cluster. I expect it to behave like this. An article describing these results is published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society and is available online. The authors are Helen Russell (University of Nottingham, UK), Paul Nulsen (Centre for Astrophysics | Harvard University and Smithsonian University), Andy Fabian (University of Cambridge, UK), Thomas Braben (University of Nottingham), and Niel Brandt (Pennsylvania State University). , Lucy Crews (University of Nottingham), Michael McDonald (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Christopher Reynolds (University of Maryland), Jeremy Saunders (Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Research), and Sylvain Veil (University of Maryland). NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center manages the Chandra program. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory’s Chandra X-ray Center manages science from Cambridge, Massachusetts and flight operations from Burlington, Massachusetts.