Milky Way Black Hole
NASA - Artistic rendering of a Black Hole
Scientists have confirmed that there is a giant black hole in the centre of our galaxy, The Milky Way!
Using the European Southern Observatory in Chille, German astronomers have been tracking the movement of 28 stars circling the centre of The Milky Way.
What’s a black hole?
A black hole is formed when a star of sufficient mass undergoes gravitational collapse, with most or all of its mass compressed into a sufficiently small area of space, causing infinite spacetime curvature at that point (a “singularity”). Such a massive spacetime curvature allows nothing, not even light, to escape from the “event horizon,” or border. - Curtessy About.com
Researchers from Max-Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Germany suggest that the black hole was 27,000 light years, or 158 thousand, million, million miles from our Earth.
“Undoubtedly the most spectacular aspect of our 16-year study, is that it has delivered what is now considered to be the best empirical evidence that super-massive black holes do really exist,” said the head of the research team, Professor Reinhard Genzel.
“The stellar orbits in the galactic centre show that the central mass concentration of four million solar masses must be a black hole, beyond any reasonable doubt.”