Astronomers have discovered a particularly sneaky black hole

Discovery sheds light on star death, black hole formation and gravitational waves

When it comes to domain[{” attribute=””>black hole research, it seems there is always something new and exciting happening.

In 1922, Albert Einstein first published his book explaining the theory of general relativity – which postulated black holes. Now, one hundred years later, astronomers captured actual images of the black hole at the center of the Milky Way. In a recent paper, a team of astronomers describes another exciting new discovery: the first “dormant” black hole observed outside of the galaxy.

I am an astrophysicist who has studied black holes – the most dense objects in the universe – for nearly two decades. Black holes that do not emit any detectable light are known as dormant black holes. They are notoriously difficult to find. This new discovery is especially exciting because it provides insight into the formation and evolution of black holes. This information is essential for understanding gravitational waves as well as other astronomical events.

What exactly is VFTS 243?

VFTS 243 is a binary system, which means it is composed of two objects that orbit a common center of mass. The first object is a very hot, blue star with 25 times the mass of the Sun, and the second is a black hole nine times more massive than the Sun. VFTS 243 is located in the Tarantula Nebula within the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way located about 163,000 light-years from Earth.

This video begins with a view of the Milky Way and zooms in to VFTS 243, which is located in the Large Magellanic Cloud.

The black hole in VFTS 243 is considered dormant because it emits no detectable radiation. This is in stark contrast to other binary systems in which strong X-rays are detected from the black hole.

The black hole is about 33 miles (54 kilometers) in diameter and is dwarfed by the energetic star, which is about 200,000 times larger. Both rapidly revolve around a common center of mass. Even with the most powerful telescopes, the system visually appears to be a single blue dot.

Find dormant black holes

Astronomers suspect that there are hundreds of these binary systems with black holes that don’t emit X-rays hidden in the Milky Way and the Large Magellanic Cloud. Black holes are most easily seen when they remove matter from a companion star, a process known as “feeding”.

The power supply produces a disk of gas and dust that surrounds the black hole. As material from the disk falls toward the black hole, friction heats the accretion disk to millions of degrees. These hot disks of matter emit an enormous amount of X-rays. The first black hole to be detected in this way is the famous Cygnus X-1 system.

For years astronomers have known that VFTS 243 is a binary system, but it was unclear whether the system was a pair of stars or a dance between a single star and a black hole. To determine which was true, the research team studying the binary used a technique called spectral disentanglement. This technique separates the light from VFTS 243 into its constituent wavelengths, which is similar to what happens when white light enters a prism and the different colors are produced.

This analysis revealed that the light from VFTS 243 came from a single source, not two separate stars. With no detectable radiation emanating from the star’s companion, the only possible conclusion was that the second body in the binary is a black hole and thus the first dormant black hole found outside the Milky Way galaxy.

Why is VFTS 243 important?

Most black holes with a mass of less than 100 Suns are formed from the collapse of a massive star. When this happens there is often a huge explosion known as a supernova.

The fact that the black hole in the VFTS 243 system is in a circular orbit with the star is strong evidence that there was no supernova explosion, which otherwise could have kicked the black hole out of the system – or at the very least disrupt the orbit. Instead, it appears the progenitor star collapsed directly to form the black hole without an explosion.

The massive star in the VFTS 243 system will only live another 5 million years – a nod to astronomical timescales. The death of the star should lead to the formation of another black hole, turning the VFTS 243 system into a black hole binary.

To date, astronomers have detected nearly 100 events where binary black holes merge and produce ripples in spacetime. But how these binary black hole systems form is still unknown, which is why VFTS 243 and similar systems yet to be discovered are so vital for future research. Maybe nature has a sense of humor – because black holes are the darkest objects in existence and emit no light, but they illuminate our basic understanding of the universe.

Written by Idan Ginsburg, Academic Faculty of Physics and Astronomy, Georgia State University.

This article first appeared in The Conversation.

For more on this research, see “Black Hole Police” Discover Needle in a Haystack.

Reference “A silent X-ray black hole born from a negligible kick in a massive binary from the Large Magellanic Cloud” by Tomer Shenar, Hugues Sana, Laurent Mahy, Kareem El-Badry, Pablo Marchant, Norbert Langer, Calum Hawcroft , Matthias Fabry, Koushik Sen, Leonardo A. Almeida, Michael Abdul-Masih, Julia Bodensteiner, Paul A. Crowther, Mark Gieles, Mariusz Gromadzki, Vincent Hénault-Brunet, Artemio Herrero, Alex de Koter, Patryk Iwanek, Szymon Kozłowski, Daniel J. Lennon, Jesús Maíz Apellániz, Przemysław Mróz, Anthony FJ Moffat, Annachiara Picco, Paweł Pietrukowicz, Radosław Poleski, Krzysztof Rybicki, Fabian RN Schneider, Dorota M. Skowron, Jan Skowron, Igor Soszyński, Michał K. Szymański, Silvia Toonen, Andrzej Udalski, Krzysztof Ulaczyk, Jorick S. Vink and Marcin Wrona, July 18, 2022, natural astronomy.
DOI: 10.1038/s41550-022-01730-y