Japanese researchers believe that the first “photo” of a black hole may be wrong. The team created the image M87*black hole at the center of the galaxy M87, after three years of analysis, and it will be markedly different from what was released by the collaboration Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) in 2019.

The biggest highlight of the final EHT image is brilliant ring, which would be the result of the black hole’s extreme gravity bending light from the hot plasma orbiting it. However, the Japanese team wonders if this ring actually exists.

Eight radio telescopes around the world were used to create the EHT image. How do you explain Space today, the array essentially works like a giant telescope called an interferometer. Information from radio telescopes is combined to produce the final result using an algorithm that adds other information about the black hole and telescope configuration to “fill in forms” and get an image. However, this filling will require previous assumptionswhich may differ in other analyses.

Scientists win $3 million for first photo of black hole
A team of 347 scientists win the Breakthrough Prize, the Oscar of Science

This is exactly the case: the Japan National Astronomical Observatory team reprocessed the EHT data, assuming that much wider field of view than members of the Event Horizon Telescope collaboration. This change caused the glowing ring to disappear, leaving them with two separate glowing dots.

Makoto Miyoshi, one of the researchers, says the limited field of view may have caused artifacts in the final EHT image. He also adds that the same error could have occurred in a photograph of Sagittarius A*, a black hole captured at the center of the Milky Way.

Geoffrey Bauer, EHT Project Scientist, responds that using a larger field of view results in an incorrect image, and that the field of view used by the EHT team reflects the area that the telescope actually observed. In his words, “you can get almost anything you want if you give yourself that kind of freedom.”

…..

Thinking about buying goods online? Discover the Save the Connected World extension for Google Chrome. It’s free and offers you price comparisons at major stores and coupons so you can always buy at the best price. Download now.

Via: SpaceToday