Johns Hopkins researchers have discovered a hypothetical celestial body called a topological soliton that mimics a black hole but emits weak rays of light. It looks like a black hole and bends light like a black hole, but it may actually be a new type of star.

While the mystery object is a hypothetical mathematical construct, new modeling by Johns Hopkins researchers suggests that there may be other celestial objects in space that are hidden from even the best telescopes on Earth. Findings will be published in a journal Physical Inspection D.

“We were very surprised,” said Pierre Heidmann, a Johns Hopkins University physicist who led the study. “The object looks like a black hole, but its dark spot emits light.”

The discovery of gravitational waves in 2015 shook the world of astrophysics as it confirmed the existence of black holes. Co-author and Johns Hopkins physicist Abraham said the Johns Hopkins team, inspired by these discoveries, decided to explore the possibility of other objects that could produce similar gravitational effects but pass as black holes when observed by ultrasensitive sensors on Earth. bach.

“How can you say you don’t have a black hole? We don’t have a good way to test this,” Bach said. “Studying hypothetical objects like topological solitons will also help us understand this.”

The new simulation realistically depicts what the Johns Hopkins team calls a topological soliton. The simulations show that from afar the object looks like a blurred photograph of a black hole, but when viewed up close it looks like something else entirely.

At this stage, the object is hypothetical. But the fact that the team was able to construct it using mathematical equations and show what it looks like with simulations suggests there may be other types of celestial bodies in space that are hidden from even the best telescopes on Earth.