Radio telescopes capture best-ever snapshot of black hole jets

Posted By News On May 20, 2011 - 8:00pm

An international team, including NASA-funded researchers, using radio telescopes located throughout the Southern Hemisphere has produced the most detailed image of particle jets erupting from a supermassive black hole in a nearby galaxy.

"These jets arise as infalling matter approaches the black hole, but we don't yet know the details of how they form and maintain themselves," said Cornelia Mueller, the study's lead author and a doctoral student at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg in Germany.

The new image shows a region less than 4.2 light-years across -- less than the distance between our sun and the nearest star. Radio-emitting features as small as 15 light-days can be seen, making this the highest-resolution view of galactic jets ever made. The study will appear in the June issue of Astronomy and Astrophysics and is available online.

Mueller and her team targeted Centaurus A (Cen A), a nearby galaxy with a supermassive black hole weighing 55 million times the sun's mass. Also known as NGC 5128, Cen A is located about 12 million light-years away in the constellation Centaurus and is one of the first celestial radio sources identified with a galaxy.

Seen in radio waves, Cen A is one of the biggest and brightest objects in the sky, nearly 20 times the apparent size of a full moon. This is because the visible galaxy lies nestled between a pair of giant radio-emitting lobes, each nearly a million light-years long.

These lobes are filled with matter streaming from particle jets near the galaxy's central black hole. Astronomers estimate that matter

Merging X-ray data (blue) from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory with microwave (orange) and visible images reveals the jets and radio-emitting lobes emanating from Centaurus A's central black hole.

(Photo Credit: ESO/WFI (visible); MPIfR/ESO/APEX/A.Weiss et al. (microwave); NASA/CXC/CfA/R.Kraft et al. (X-ray))

near the base of these jets races outward at about one-third the speed of light.

Using an intercontinental array of nine radio telescopes, researchers for the TANAMI (Tracking Active Galactic Nuclei with Austral Milliarcsecond Interferometry) project were able to effectively zoom into the galaxy's innermost realm.

"Advanced computer techniques allow us to combine data from the individual telescopes to yield images with the sharpness of a single giant telescope, one nearly as large as Earth itself," said Roopesh Ojha at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.

The enormous energy output of galaxies like Cen A comes from gas falling toward a black hole weighing millions of times the sun's mass. Through processes not fully understood, some of this infalling matter is ejected in opposing jets at a substantial fraction of the speed of light. Detailed views of the jet's structure will help astronomers determine how they form.

The jets strongly interact with surrounding gas, at times possibly changing a galaxy's rate of star formation. Jets play an important but poorly understood role in the formation and evolution of galaxies. NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope has detected much higher-energy radiation from Cen A's central region.

"This radiation is billions of times more energetic than the radio waves we detect, and exactly where it originates remains a mystery," said Matthias Kadler at the University of Wuerzburg in Germany and a collaborator of Ojha. "With TANAMI, we hope to probe the galaxy's innermost depths to find out."

Left: The giant elliptical galaxy NGC 5128 is the radio source known as Centaurus A. Vast radio-emitting lobes (shown as orange in this optical/radio composite) extend nearly a million light-years from the galaxy. Credit: Capella Observatory (optical), with radio data from Ilana Feain, Tim Cornwell, and Ron Ekers (CSIRO/ATNF), R. Morganti (ASTRON), and N. Junkes (MPIfR). Right: The radio image from the TANAMI project provides the sharpest-ever view of a supermassive black hole's jets. This view reveals the inner 4.16 light-years of the jet and counterjet, a span less than the distance between our sun and the nearest star. The image resolves details as small as 15 light-days across. Undetected between the jets is the galaxy's 55-million-solar-mass black hole.

(Photo Credit: : NASA/TANAMI/Müller et al.)

Source: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center

what if the jets are a result of radiation or leak from a other dimension, like a ball of "radiation" who is grinding friktion whit a other ball from a other dimension who leaks energy, and the black hole in the senter is the meeting point, and the galaxy is a result of the "friktion", and the jet is a result of energy from the other dimension who is resonating with this dimension???????

just shooting in the dark here....

You're retarded.

Agreed. He is definitely retarded.

Or a string 'theory' person.

lol - well said!

What that European ass said has little to nothing to do with string theory.

A retarded 'string theory' person.

Please don't feed the trolls.

Seriously...I guarantee there is no one in the world that doesn't know how to spell "center" correctly, yet understands any of what he said or knows the word resonate. If you're going to even try to troll, be smarter?

Ever think that he may not be a native english speaker? I agree his hypothesis is a ludicrous one at best, but I will be willing to bet that there are at least some people in the world that don't speak english as a first language and can't quite grasp the intricacies of this ridiculous language.

all of you guys who are criticizing are the retarded ones! remember when we thought the earth was flat? how retarded were the ones who denied it ??? you guys don't learn...not even with history! you are close-minded pricks who like to feel superior to others! just shut it and think about your idiotic state of mind.

niggas still getting trolled

Please explain this " niggas " reference , what is this about ?

No need for an argument here. We already have children in congress doing exactly that. The real retard? Our beloved president whom bought out all of the debt from all the banks and laid it to rest upon our government. This beautiful jetting particles of light should be looked upon in awe not one of us can create that so for the love of whatever you believe in let bygones be bygones let people with off the wall ideas whom can't spell be themselves it doesn't affect your health, your sex life how many miles you get to the gallon in your vehicle so just let it go!

the whole flat thing is just an urban myth the general consensus even in way back when was that the earth was round. saw it on QI

People feel the need to constantly shoot others down. A theory is a theory, without them we would have gotten nowhere. We would still be creating fire with sticks and stones. Cyril Herman Hinshelwood once said- "Science is an imaginative adventure of the mind seeking truth in a world of mystery" ...having an imagination and wanting to delve deeper into the unsolved mysteries of life isn't retarded, it's inventive, creative, and curious. Something you feeble minded people know nothing about. Have anything to say? Email me or find me on facebook: facebook.com/hopedb

center*
senter lol

and "friktion." Want to join the grammar/spelling police with me?

In most of the Scandinavian languages, "center" is spelled "senter" and "friction" is spelled "friksjon". Probably just a drunk swede or something.

the fuck it isnt

Learn to spell.

EAT IIIITTTTTT!!!!

Somebody's on crack!

a other? a ball who is...?? "radiation" ??
whit? friktion?? senter??? Are you serious?

Obviously a very un-educated guess based on your extremely poor grasp of correct grammar and spelling.

I hope you don't expect anyone to actually take you seriously?

a other > try "another"
a ball who is > try "that is".
"radiation" & "friktion" > don't need to be enclosed in inverted commas.
whit > try "with"
friktion > try "friction"
senter > try "center" (US) or "centre" (correct spelling).

Use a capital letter (the BIG ones)at the start of a sentence. Try breaking your statement down into smaller sentences by using full stops instead of "and".
All that is one sentence? Try saying it out loud with one breath then?

Next time don't be so lazy and put the effort into your post. You might actually then get a direct response to the question asked, instead of getting flamed for writing like an absolute moron.

Yes, just like Trolls, Grammar Nazis are everywhere :)

the dude could be german. don't they spell all their hard c or k sounds with a k. either way i'm sure everyone posting on this response column is wrong about what ever this is or just has no idea what this article is talking about. this includes me. CREATIONISM WAS RIGHT JESUS WILL RISE AGAIN AND JUDGE THE NON-BELIEVERS!!

I hope you kill yourself.

They have spell check in Germany, I believe.

awwwwww do you feel better now? do you need a hug?

How can any of these guys on here talk shit bout something no one knows about, I like your ideas they are something to ponder about, heck even Stephen Hawking has theory's about other dimensions. I thing they should think before they talk there shit that some of the greatist minds ever to walk earth where considered retarded, Einstien anyone.

no guys, fellas, he has an point... imagine for yourself the "infant" power of the black hole? enormuos. one alone can annilate EArth! The Energy Is Probably Enugh For An Rip In The Time-Space Continuum. its why the unverse expants! IT"S SOO SIMPLE GUYS

More like "typing in the dark here."

Don't worry buddy, I got you covered. In act of good faith I present to you this website! http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/index2.htm
It shall help you learn what you clearly missed in all your school years.

It could be that he didn't miss it in school. He just never had it. This is the internet. Just because he is typing in English doesn't mean it's his first language, or even if it is his first, could be not his best language. It's my first, and I still think its evil.

I <3 U

Nice i can dig-it; multi-verse; parralel makes sense 2me especially considering all contemporary facts proven to be opinions of the time improves with more membranes then fabrics itself with simple brilliance.p:s sometimes we are teapots sometimes we are cups thanks for the pour.

Thank you so much for not jumping down the OP's throat for his spelling and grammar. Way too many trolls and grammar freaks abound on the internet. Genuine discussion has been lost. Even if the OP is a troll, there's a glimmer of a good idea.

Amazing data integration. Imagine.... one Earth diameter telescope!
Wait for the upgrade when a Moon Base is added in a few years.

All we can see is atoms being stretched from afar. The atomic particles move so fast that they go through the hole, overshoot the hole, then get drawn back into the hole. This theory not only reveals a blackholes composition; it is the basis of all universes. Imagine a meteor of epic proportions somewhat like Pangea was. Now picture that being squeezed into a tiny hole like a pressure washer to the point where it travels so far that it can't come back. Boom.

How about opening a grammar book, and learning how to use punctuation marks? Because to be honest, you sound like the asshole, not the other way around. Also, don't be so brainwashed into thinking you have the most open mind on this planet, because you're clearly being just as closed minded and cynical as they are. If you want people to actually listen and understand a position or idea, they need to be educated not ridiculed by some guy on the internet. Otherwise they'll never learn and forever remain bitter to people such as you, who claim to "know it all".

That is all, thanks for reading this and have a nice day! (OPEN YOUR HEART BUDDY)

Please, go back to school and let the Grown-ups talk in peace.

Your sentence is so pathetically written that nobody would take it seriously anyway. Even if one overlooks the gaping holes in your grammatical skills, or lack there-of.

Intelligent viewpoint = FAIL
Serious opinion = FAIL
Credibility = FAIL

Strike three kiddo, hit the showers junior.

Boy, aren't you all high and mighty...get over yourself! You ever here the saying "Pride comes before a fall?"

thank you!!!

Your all just close minded government thinking trash well it's good that there thinking outside the box instead of u assholes who only see one way government thinkers you guys are the stupid ones so keep thinking out of the box and not how the government brainwashed you weak minded people thanks for reading this and have a nice day( OPEN YOUR MIND PEOPLE) and the ignorant one's open a beer smoke a blunt stay simple minded and keep fucking up the world do what u do best make money and destroy the planet the human race is only good at one thing DESTRUCTION wake up people think for yourself for once and use your mind thank u( can't wait to hear all the ignorance on this :))

"you're all close minded"
You to are close minded, find a real teacher.
At least you're searching....Or do you know all?lol
One day...

Well since the real stupid people are the assholes who are more focused on proper punctuation instead of what the person is actually trying to say. Sorry there not perfect like you, like he said open your mind. Think past the common stupidity any theory in this world is just an educated guess but it's worth a shot.

dude.....it's "TOO" so don't go throwing rocks in glass houses you moron.

Actually, you needed to insert a comma in your sentence to separate the clauses.

"...in glass houses, you moron."

Try starting your sentence with a capital letter too e.g. Dude, (comma also required, not leaders). Furthermore, the proper correction would have been "too", not in capitals, followed by a comma. You also missed the opportunity to correct the writer's misuse of "there" where they should have used "they're".

The single most important factor of being a Grammar Nazi is making sure you don't make any grammatical errors while you're preaching.

If ignorance is bliss, you must be a very happy person indeed.

"You too(to) are of closed mind, find a real...."

Don't knock the non-speller, clearly they are foreign. English is the hardest language to learn. Don't be salty because someone out there has a theory of their own. We could all sit here and debate all day along about the "what-if" causes and effects of something like this. Who's to say that it isn't a by-product of other-dimensional waste? Or even inter-dimensional? No one knows for sure the exact nature of black holes, which makes them so enticing and mysterious. It's easy to imagine what they could be, but harder to understand their truer nature. And until there is more solid research done on them no one here can say that it IS or is NOT anything. Id personally like to imagine that black holes are indeed wormholes of some sort but until we can send something in and pull it back out we'll never know. Our entire knowledge of our universe and the entities residing in it is yet still so primitive, we have a long way to go yet before we even come close to understanding the full potential of our universe. Just sayin'.

Black holes are obviously non existent... You cant see anything in the photo... and that is what SCIENCE calls a black hole... its invisible... you cant see it but supposedly you can see the affects.. how can you even begin to take notice in such a job where you cant even count all the stars? I personally thing its all over-rated.
If you want the TRUTH, not THEORY... pick up the bible and read!

Science is something that can be tested, has variables and can be re-created....

Good Luck finding your answers.. Do some soul searching... Start with the good book.

I've read better.
Also, God is just as visible and tangible as the black holes.

I'm sorry if some don't want to base all of their knowledge on the work of hundreds of uneducated, superstitious old men. It's bad enough that religion was invented just because we didn't understand how the universe works, but at least that makes some sort of sense. It's childish, of course, and can be compared to toddlers' thoughts of monsters when they hear a "bump" in the dark that they can't otherwise explain.

What's nonsensical is those who, when given an explanation with any sort of validity, adamantly substitute for it the ignorant non-explanation given to them by the bible. A THEORY, I would think, is much better than simply saying "It's above our understanding," which is, in effect, a glorified "I don't know." Religion is nothing but the acceptance of ignorance.

Right on brother (assuming you are in fact a he). Got to love the heated discussion here, I came here to learn about stars and stuff and now I want to learn another language because English has been ruined for me. Forget The Bible, it tells you nothing but fables, if there is one book I recommend, it would be the Oxford English dictionary, available at all respectable book stores. Failing that, buy The Road to Reality by Roger Penrose.

Black holes can be proven to exist by our detection of the radiation they give off. We don't have to see them to know they are there. Much like your god, they are invisible. Yet, unlike the big man, there IS proof that they exist. Maybe you should pick up a science text book before making uneducated claims.

Let there be Light
Light shining on your ignorance

You people judging him on his grammar are the retards. That person was letting us know his idea, the possibilities that could be. He /She was not proving to anyone what they can or cannot spell. Try not to be so close minded and ignorant.

Funny question. When you look into a void what do you see?

... a polavoid....

I think it's amazing how people judge other people based on their own perspectives. I am guessing that everyone who was judging Ron (the first post) has no idea as to what is inside a black hole, or what is on the other side of a black hole. I can't believe that anyone would judge another person based on their own ignorance. Whoever DOES claim to know what's inside of a black hole or what's on the other side of a black hole, is completely arrogant and self justifying due to them NOT having the experience of going into one for themselves.

To say something about the pictures... has anyone thought that the reason we see something from both ends of a black hole is because one "face" is mirrored?

To rule something out as a possibility in this universe is very

naive.

Tarded all over again.

1st

Well, out of about 30 comments, ostensibly on a well-done amalgamation of different fields of astronomy, there were just 2 or 3 on topic. The rest - half-baked ideas and theories, critiques thereof, English criticisms, flaming ....

How about getting back to the implications of the topic itself?

What the effffffffffffff is going on here? Why is this conversation on this page?

im just throwing this out there but it seems as if the guy whoever spelt "friktion" purposely wrote it like that. plus i dont think anyone should be negative towards a person just cus their bad at spelling or denounce them.

so,stumble upon brought me to this page; throughly impressed with this finding. After assessing the article I realized that the truth is far more complicated for anyone to understand. however, reading the banter between these ladies, it entertained me very much. the one being critical to the intellectual, or at the least creative, is being ridiculed for having an imagination. frankly, I believe one little man most likely gets it in the rectum; hence his apprehension.

StumbleUpon got me to this page too. I find this coversation to be incredible! All of the comments that could have been made, you focus on the first post by some fool and poke fun at his gramer??? Why ladies and gents? Why? You fail as a star-lovng, moon-hugging, planet-kissing community (aka astronomy lovers)!

There its been said.

And now I say...good day!

You foolish people! It was I, Stephen Hawking who posted the response to the article which postulated the innovative interpretations of the observations - the much commented upon, 'grinding friktion' and 'radiation balls' etc.

Granted that my communication software was malfunctioning at the time but I am still immensely disappointed that no one was able to discern my unmistakable genius at work in that post. I'd have thought the concept of '... grinding friktion whit a other ball' would have been a dead give-away. I'd have thought that upon reading those words, no matter how they were spelled, most people would have exclaimed to themselves, 'My god! Hawking has done it again! Such simplicity! Such exquisite, sublime elegance! He's not only managed to discover the fundamental mechanism behind the creation of the multiverse but he's even managed to express his monumental find in terms of a new Grand Unification Theory!

Alas! All you could do was mock and lampoon. Well, let's see you mock this, you fools!

b = gf2

(ball equals grinding friktion squared, where b is equal whit a other ball)

zomg I <3 you!! *squee!*
P.S. StumbleUpon brought me here, too. XD

The article was fantastic; however, the comments that followed for the most part were rather immature and unnecessary. Leave off with the egotistical spouting--live and let live :)

Welcome to the Internet! :)

I do not agree that the 'article was fantastic'. It gives little background, no links to additional info and it repeats in several places.

The subject is certainly fantastic but not the article.

And, I found the comments quite entertaining :)

I totally agree that the article lacks substance, it could be more comprehensive, it could inform a little more... However, it gave a hint of the subject and in case we wish to know more about it, we should further investigate it. I'm sorry if I did not write in perfect English, however, I am Brazilian and am not obliged to write in perfect English, as I am sure that the people that criticized the person who did not wrote correctly, is also incapable to write in Portuguese. By the way, Portuguese is the language we speak in Brazil!

Does anyone feel like they've just read a whole conversation in the trade chat channel from The World of Warcraft?

You can trade black hole jets in WoW?

This is the best set of comments, ever. Thank you one, thank you all. Fuget the spelling.

It just goes to show - you can't be too careful.

4.2 LIGHT YEARS IS 4.2 LIGHT YEARS. 55 TIMES AN ANY ONE OF THE MANY GALAXY SUN THINE SHALL REGAURD WITH TEXT ACCEPTABLE TO MODERN SCIENCE, THIS IMAGE IS ANNONOMOUSLYU TAKEN, FLARES IN THIS SPECTRUM ARE SHOT IN 35MM FILM, FROM A SPACE STATION BY A REAL ASTRONOMER WHO TAKES CREDIT, WEINIES.

GOD BLESS YOU MY SON

DAMON, SCOTT ASTEARO/ NUCLEO PHYSICS 96'DEMETPROMO I AND I TELL. YOUR NEW STARLORE IS AMAZING . HANK. SUN. LOVE YOU.

If the good lord had meant us to go a meddlin' and a fiddlin' with black hole jets and the like, I reckon he'd have provided special asbestos glove trees from which we could have harvested protective equipment. Or maybe he'd have given us teflon hands and special goggles.

Either way, these black hole thingumybobs ain't much good to the human race as far as I can see. You can't fly the jets because they're too hot to touch and you can't use the holes for anything coz you can't find the damn things!

Besides, we already have our own jets like American Airways and suchlike and we already have spades to dig our own holes with. So there's no good will come of pokin' about up God's hole.

I say best leave the Lord's hole well alone and tell those pesky scientists to poke about in their own holes.

I mean, what good ever came of this new-fangled, book-larnin' science nonsense?

I am a norwegian and I can`t write english very well. I can se connections in some sciense, and tryed one badly written theory on this article, I think it`s possible to apply the compton effekt formula on the 2 "friction" balls I refer to

To Anonymous - Are you really Steven Hawking ? I`d like to talk with you sometime, anyway - This is just a guess and I`m sure I`ll probably be ridiculed for it but What if it`s just the remnants of a super huge long ago explosion (Super Nova or larger) and now it`s collapsing back on itself and as the collapse happens the gravity of the center of this hole becomes larger with every planet that`s added .Therefor causing even more planets to be attracted and condensed in to a tiny super dense planet with massive gravity. You just cannot see it through the clouds.

The resulting cloud just surrounding the center could be debris and the black cloud around the left bottom could be smoke of some kind. I know that smoke means fire and to make fire you need oxygen, so many of the planets must contain oxygen in some form.

The spouts at either end are the results of different interactions of minerals and matter or it may be as simple as heat escaping ( like a volcano but of course much more massive).

I cannot see this being in two separate dimensions because we`ve never found a reverse black hole in this dimension. If I`m wrong I would love to know it.

For the rest of the comments - lets not stray from the conversation and try to put up some valid theories as to what it supposedly is or is not.

Thank You.

The friction idea seems to be to far fetched. Has anyone seen another dimension? - please don`t leave a stupid answer like - on the Twilight Zone.

Yeah, I'm Stephen Hawking, so what?

Just having a few beers here and firing up the bong. Since reading these posts I've kinda given up on astrophysics and cosmology and taken to watching cartoons all day instead. I like The Simpsons but there's too many repeats. My fav episode is where Mo gets a date and promises her he'll buy her a pizza 'the size of a toilet seat' lol. That just cracks me up.

Hang on a sec... someone was on the phone there asking me about the evaporation of black holes there. I told them I quit with all that stuff. I mean what's the point?

Damn it. I just set fire to my trousers.

What's your fav episode of the simpsons?

peace out dudes

I was not saying anything bad about you, I just said is that you to provoke a response, not for any other reason and I was just taken aback that you would be on here commenting at all.

Don`t quit astrophysics or cosmology - Smokin` just makes you forget things(short term memory). I`ve been thinking about my comment and I just want to say that I think you may have something with your examination and explanation of this picture but what`s in this other dimension? you say - there are balls of radiation flowing toward the meeting point - Would that be a black hole on the other side as well maybe? You say it`s friction between universes ? Can you elaborate? This all seems pretty cool to me and I guarantee you have much more education than I do on this subject.
I just said it seemed far fetched but again I was trying to provoke a response, not make you quit.

I`m sorry dude but that is how I seen the picture , when it asked what do you think I just answered , I`m no Harvard graduate and I was not thinking about things the way you were in your response.

" Anyway , -There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. Hamlet Act 1, scene 5, " . Maybe you`ll know for sure but I may never . My guess at this picture was just simply that, a guess.

There are so many things to learn and so little time to learn them and people that can take it to your level are rare indeed. So shut off the remote , check out these Spider webs -http://www.trinity.edu/jdunn/spiderdrugs.htm - Have a laugh and then get back to what you do best.

One question - Do you have anything I can refer to to learn about the whole universe and how the higher educated world has figured things out up to now with the math to back it up and the explanation of the math used -if you do can you point me in its direction please. I need a lot of catch up learning in this field . Thanks.

Anyway I like seeing you on the news, I`m always paying attention and I just wish I could be in on the process of figuring these things out and maybe watching the Simpsons with you as we do, very cool. My favorite television show of all time is probably " Married with Children" , The Simpsons are easily in the top 5 though.

And for the Simpsons, and we all definitely like the Simpsons - my favorite part of any episode is when Homer is hanging upside down and a piece of pie falls on the floor and he says " mmmm floor pie" with his tongue hanging out and drooling - That`s just too funny.

But seriously if you quit who else can do the math you can? Honestly don`t pay attention to these idiots that are on here cutting you up because they are far less educated than you and you see thing differently , in a scientific and imaginative way.

P.S. Looking at your red eyes on the news one day years ago I could tell you just finished watching the "Simpsons" , I thought I knew what you were doing and now I know it`s the "Simpsons" ( lol ).

I like turtles.

Definitely prefer publishing as little as possible, unlike you SH. However, for this you are to be admired, as I was quite disappointed missing you in Princeton by almost a week at the bookstore signing last year. Had been remotely concerned about you during that period for the only reason that you might have been losing your signature sense of humor and obviously with potential cause, as I recall. At least, one of the walnuts above has a pea under it.

I'm deeply disappointed that common minds leave comments on site's like these... One piece of advise thought to the common minds on the web. Firstly if you don't agree, you have to have a counter argument in science, if you attack someones spelling or character you have clearly loss the argument and it is recommended that you should shut your month and leave the site. Please common mind leave these sites alone go rather follow your celebs!

Well aren't you a grumpy one. :)

I agree that if you don't have anything besides plain "trashing" as counter argument you might want to consider not responding at all. But you should be careful with your generalization of the "common mind".

With an IQ below 160 and not as much as a bachelor degree (yet) I must fall under the category "common minds", but that doesn't necessarily exclude me for having a genuine interest and oppinion about the subject of this article. I might not have the equation to back up a proposed theory but it shouldn't make it less relevant or valid. Who knows, based on numerous articles, books, papers, documentaries or just a logic mind I could have the necessary background for making a valid guess. Besides doesn't every theory in science start with a guess, and then later finding the math to back it up? - or am I wrong in being here on this site? (This being as much a question to those frenzying about spelling and "shooting in the dark"-comments.)

Oh, and excuse me if there's any mispellings. God forbid I should make a typo with this crowd judging me. ;)

wow... space is amazing.

Are dyslexic people excluded from posting here?
Seems a pity.

"Black holes suck material toward them, but some of it gets spit out rather than swallowed. [...] The processes by which these jets are formed are not well understood, but seem to require magnetic fields - whose presence causes instabilities in the accretion disk that allow material to fling upwards - as well as rapidly rotating black holes, which can feed some of their energy to the magnetic field and to the jet material itself." - http://curious.astro.cornell.edu/blackholes.php

"[...] In all cases, the central engine is thought to be a rotating magnet whose reconnecting magnetic fields generate the relativistic pair plasma – of typical Lorentz factor 10^3 ± 2 – which rams the jet channels and blows the cocoons (subsonically) after having been stalled in a head. The supersonic jets form on passing a central deLaval nozzle, first proposed by Blandford and Rees in 1974, which forms naturally due to the huge density contrast of 10^-8.3T_4 with respect to the ambient medium (of temperature T, T_4:=T/10^4 K). Beam stability and narrowness are likewise guaranteed by the density contrast (of jet fluid and CSM). " - http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/klu/astr/2001/00000276/90000001/00352693

It's not exactly a gateway to a new dimension I believe, but it's still facinating stuff. :)

they are ionized gasses right?

you are all retarded...
it is not your fault.

I eat your boogers yum

Well, THAT was entertaining. #stumblerules

what the f*ck is wrong with all of you?

ARE THE JETS FROM THE SPIN AXIS IF SO THAT WOULD TELL US SOMETHING .IE HIGH ENERGY AURORA BOREALIS

This was the best end of the work day time suck this week! Black holes ARE powerful!

Thank you to all who participated in making my day brighter!

You know all of you are stupid. This is the Internet who on the Internet spells things correctly with your TMI LOL FML OMG I mean really are we all that lazy and the first guy on here has his short theory yet I have not read anybody else with a theory of there own so lets grow up and move the f on.

I'm not going to pretend I understand much of physics and the workings of space, but this is beautiful. So let's all just admire this fantastic piece of the Universe?

Holy shit every ones' comment on here was about that one guy's comment. who gives a fuck if he's retarded or not. I'm sure 90% of you are between the ages of 18-28, believing you are much more educated than the next person. you're all a bunch of douchebags,so to put it simply just shut the fuck up.

Hmm...mocking/discounting a theory solely based on the perception of poor education in the person proposing it, and making the erroneous conclusion that education = intelligence. Sounds, um...familiar.

It amazes me that, of all the brilliant minds we have on this planet, the most we can come up with in rebuttal to a remark we disagree with is to point out grammar or spelling errors and the use of profanity.

To those few who actually posted a reply that didn't include either of those two methods of communication, my congratulations and appreciation are offered.

this is very interesting to read just wonder they why are commenting of the comments not the story?>?

Not for over a century has there been any scientific controversy over creationism. Having no science to offer, contemporary advocates of creationism opt instead to press their views through lawsuits and campaigns of misinformation, seeking to bypass the scientific community altogether and directly indoctrinate the next generation of students with fraudulent objections to science.

Although creationist legal manoeuvres have thus far resulted in one spectacular failure after another, the creationist PR effort has enjoyed more success. The only hope for those who care about science is to match misinformation with information: to invest as much time and money into educating the public as creationists do into misleading it.

The bible is a collection of stories written by authors many years after the events. there is no science in the bible, it is merely propaganda aimed at recruiting the unbelievers. natural phenomena does not need stories and or belief systems to exist it just happens. why do we need to be all powerful. We are so insignificant in our own little world. we have been here for just a blink in the age of the universe, yet we think we where created in the image of god, what a joke, wake up people. religion is here for one purpose only - power. the world is the way it is today because of religious fanatics over past 2 millennia only. I cant conceive how everything you need to know is in the bible, sure be good don't kill, etc, but do not limit your intellect by being so closed minded that if its not written in this book then it cannot be the truth. rant rant rant. and why not use a spell checker dude, so easy.

I can't believe so many people are talking about grammar right now... it's ridiculous.

Nice photo. Lousy comments.

NWA- niggas wit attitude

Friktion. Totally.

Kanye West was so good in his original song "harder." Wait, are we not just trolling each other? Sure, there's no reason to believe the first guy is right. Keep an open mind. I personally believe it's a load of crap, but that's just me. And what do I know? That college degree in theoretical mathematical physics probably didn't cover black holes or string theory. And no one called it a quasar, I'm proud. Good for the first guy for voicing his idea, I was glad to hear it. Should supersymmetry fall through (not going to happen, but still) and string theory be thrown out (again, unlikely, but possible), you could have just found a new piece of physics, however unlikely. If science has taught us anything, it's that no idea should be dismissed because it's crazy and original. Ideas should only be dismissed through math and experiments, and even then revisited when we inevitably turn out wrong on something.

I vote we all go for a cup of tea, relax, and have a good time. All this bickering seems to bring out one of the rather pathetic sides to humanity. Hopefully none of us are actually so simpleminded as to think anything written here in the comments section is totally correct. Now, to find some fancy schmancy teleportation device that will bring all of us lame internet acquaintances together for that tea...oh, wait, that might require some science...*sigh*

You're kick ass!!

I came to this page from stumble. the pictures were cool, and the comments are hysterical. troll on

I don't know where all this lame bs, that you all seem to be giving to each other, is coming from. Spelling? Punctuation? Petty Ridiculousness. Did you even read the story, or are you just on here to cast insults back and forth, because you have nothing better to do. All i have to say is that we are ALL connected, not only to each other, but to everything that is, in the awesome universe. What is said and done affects not only a single person, but to us all as a whole. So, we need to treat each other with respect and kindness. It can only make us stronger.....United We Stand....Divided We Fall.

DOWN WITH THE NWO

LOVE LAUGH AND THEN LOVE SOME MORE
PEACE

Waht's itmpronat is that you can urdtaesnnd waht the psoren is gtnietg accrsos. It's claeld 'ciatcmuomoinn'.

I prumese you can read this.
How's my snepillg?

Peace upon those who follow guidance
I / I thank you for these topics.
II / We as Muslims these topics through our Lord increase our faith.
All What we're saying in the universe is in heaven and we know that there are seven heavens, which indicates that there is one Creatoris able to create these things and maintain their balance; and GodAlmighty, if any defect, even a very simple do not know what the result will be because we then had died all.
We must after seeing these wonders to believe in God.
GloryAallah.
Translated using Google translator.

Why dog on the damn guy if he really cant spell or use grammar check, other dimensions do exist, and in fact that is what is happening to us right as we speak, we are transferring into another dimension. the magnetic poles are changing and our earth is turning to shit because of no good republican close minded losers like the people bitching about grammar and spell check who gives a flying fuck? you can tell what hes typing so get off his back!

Dang!, didn't any smart people read the post?

Seriously???
The consensus to this article is to:
1. Bombast each other about grammar and spelling??
or
2. Random, irrelevant, religous pollution.

I too, am now guilty of contributing to the pap, but I'm sick to death of this stupidity.

Go back to surfing your porn or your bible study (whichever camp you're in) and leave your keyboard alone. If you don't have anything to contribute, then don't.

Radio telescopes capture best-ever snapshot of black hole jets

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