Latest news with #LIGOVirgoKAGRA
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Science
- Yahoo
WA observatory at risk from Trump cuts helps make stunning black hole discovery
The LIGO Hanford Observatory near the Tri-Cities and its twin in Louisiana detected ripples of time and space passing through Earth from the most massive collision of black holes ever observed, a coalition of the world's four gravitational wave observatories announced Tuesday. The gravitational waves were confirmed by comparing signals from space that were detected by both U.S. LIGO observatories despite lasting only a 10th of a second. 'This is the most massive black hole binary we've observed through gravitational waves, and it presents a real challenge to our understanding of black hole formation,' said Mark Hannam of Cardiff University in Wales, who is a member of a coalition of the world's gravitational wave observatories, in a statement. In addition to the large mass of the merging black holes, they also were spinning more rapidly than any previously detected black hole, approaching the limit allowed by Einstein's theory of general relativity. The international coalition, the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA collaboration, described the detection in a fact sheet as an event 'both extraordinary and puzzling to interpret.' It is 'a potent reminder that the cosmos still holds many surprises, and we are only just beginning to uncover them,' it said. The interpretation of the data and the announcement came as the future of at least one of the U.S. LIGO observatories is in jeopardy as deep cuts to science programs are proposed by the Trump administration. Gravitational waves are caused by cataclysmic events in space, such as colliding black holes, merging neutron stars, exploding stars and possibly even the birth of the universe itself, according to CalTech, which is a joint operator and manager of the two LIGO observatories under an agreement with the National Science Foundation. Since the U.S. Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatories made scientific history in 2015 with the first-ever direct detection of gravitational waves, or ripples in space and time, from a black hole merger, about 300 more black hole mergers have been detected. The U.S. LIGO's have collaborated on discoveries with Italy's Virgo gravitational-wave observatory since 2007 and Japan's KAGRA observatory since 2019. Massive black hole The black hole collision detected on Nov. 23, 2023, in the United States, during an international observing run, produced a final black hole about 225 times the mass of Earth's sun. The two black holes that merged had individual masses of about 100 and 140 times that of the sun. 'It looks like we are seeing mergers of mergers,' which could lead to new information about steller evolution, said Michael Landry, head of the LIGO Hanford Observatory. Current stellar evolution models don't account for black holes so massive, which raises the possibility that what was detected was the merger of black holes, at least one of which had already merged to form a larger black hole, according to Hannam. The black holes could come from an extremely dense astrophysical environment, such as a nuclear star cluster or an active galactic nucleus, where black holes are more likely to collide, according to the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA collaboration fact sheet. Now theories of steller evolution suggest that black holes with masses between about 60 and 130 solar masses, such as one of those in the detection announced Tuesday, should be rare or not even exist, according to the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA collaboration. The initial merger detected in 2015, confirming Einstein's theory of relativity, had a final black hole mass of 62 times that of the sun. And until the one announced Tuesday, the most massive black hole merger detected was 140 times the mass of the sun, the same as the larger of the merging black holes in the new detection. 'This observation once again demonstrates how gravitational waves are uniquely revealing the fundamental and exotic nature of black holes throughout the universe,' said Dave Reitze, the executive director of LIGO at CalTech The high mass and extremely rapid spinning of the black holes that merged push the limits of both gravitational-wave detection technology and current theoretical models. Confirming LIGO detection The two black holes that collided were so incredibly heavy, that the signal they sent was lower in frequency and shorter compared to other detections, Landry said. In order to confirm that the the detection was from gravitational waves from space and not something on Earth, data from two or more sources was needed, in this case the Hanford and the Livingston, La., LIGOs, Landry said. Although just a tenth of a second long, the signal was 20 times louder than the typical detector noise, and a graph of the detections at both LIGOs closely match. They give a particularly clear view of the merger's grand finale when the newly formed black hole radiates energy through gravitational waves, vibrating and finally settling into a stable state, according to the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA collaboration fact sheet. Extracting accurate information from the signal to make sure it was not a random blip in the data required the use of models that simulate what a signal would look like for different black hole pairs, accounting for the intricate dynamics of highly spinning black holes, according to the fact sheet. The modeling found that the probability of random noise mimicking the detection was less than once in 10,000 years. 'This gives us extreme confidence in the non-terrestrial origin of the signal, and thus in the reality of this gravitational-wave signal,' according to the fact sheet. The detection was from the fourth observing run of the collaboration and of the four international observatories that began in May 2023. Additional observations from the first half of the run through January 2024 will be published later this summer. Proposed LIGO closure The confirmation of the discovery of the heaviest black hole ever detected comes as the Trump administration's proposed budget for fiscal 2026 calls for closing either the Louisiana or Hanford LIGO. It is part of a 57% cut proposed by the administration for the National Science Foundation. The proposal has been given to Congress, which is working on bills now in the House and the Senate to set budgets for the National Science Foundation and its projects. According to LIGO CalTech, it is rare that a signal is so strong that a claim of detection can be made with just one observatory. Two or more detectors operating in unison are fundamental to LIGO's ability to contribute to the burgeoning field of gravitational wave astronomy, it said. To be able to hunt for and also find the visible light or other electromagnetic radiation associated with certain gravitational wave events using more traditional observatories, three or more gravitational-wave observatories are needed for triangulation to locate the region of the sky that contains the source of the wave, according to LIGO CalTech. To date, just one such source, the first-ever-known neutron star merger, has also been seen by observatories relying on light after a gravitational-wave detection. 'Though LIGO's mission is to detect gravitational waves from some of the most violent and energetic processes in the universe, the data LIGO collects may also contribute to other areas of physics such as gravitation, relativity, cosmology, astrophysics, particle physics and nuclear physics,' according to LIGO CalTech. Solve the daily Crossword
The Sun
4 days ago
- Science
- The Sun
Biggest black hole merger EVER detected has created terrifying ‘monster' that's 225 times as massive as our Sun
SCIENTISTS have discovered the biggest black hole merger ever recorded, as two massive spacetime ripples spiral into each other. The monstrous collision occurred on the outskirts of our Milky Way galaxy, and produced a black hole roughly 225 times more massive than the sun. 3 Before now, the most massive black hole merger had a total mass of 140 suns. The new collision event, dubbed GW231123, was found by the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA (LVK) Collaboration - a group of four detectors that identify cataclysmic cosmic events. Each black hole was roughly 100 to 140 times the mass of our Sun before they combined. "This is the most massive black hole binary we've observed through gravitational waves, and it presents a real challenge to our understanding of black hole formation," Mark Hannam, of Cardiff University and a member of the LVK Collaboration, said in a statement. "Black holes this massive are forbidden through standard stellar evolution models. "One possibility is that the two black holes in this binary formed through earlier mergers of smaller black holes." Evidence of the GW231123 event was discovered in late 2023, when two slight distortions in spacetime were spotted by laser detectors in Louisiana and Washington. 3 The signal that arrived at the detectors was coming from two high-mass black holes that were spinning rapidly - meaning they were hard to analyse. Charlie Hoy, of the University of Portsmouth and also a member of the LVK, explained: "The black holes appear to be spinning very rapidly - near the limit allowed by Einstein's theory of general relativity. "That makes the signal difficult to model and interpret. "It's an excellent case study for pushing forward the development of our theoretical tools." Horrifying black hole simulation shows what 'spaghettification' looks like when objects fall into 'extreme slurp' Researchers say they need to observe more similar, high-spin mergers to better calculate just how massive this most recent black hole merger is. Gregorio Carullo, of the University of Birmingham and a member of the LVK, noted: "It will take years for the community to fully unravel this intricate signal pattern and all its implications. "Despite the most likely explanation remaining a black hole merger, more complex scenarios could be the key to deciphering its unexpected features." The researchers are set to present their findings at the 24th International Conference on General Relativity and Gravitation (GR24) and the 16th Edoardo Amaldi Conference on Gravitational Waves in Glasgow, Scotland this week. Black holes are formed through the collapse of massive stars or through the merging of smaller black holes. Known black holes currently fall into just two categories: stellar-mass black holes, which range from a few to a few dozen times the Sun's mass; and supermassive black holes, which can be anywhere from about 100,000 to 50 billion times as massive as the Sun. Intermediate-mass black holes fall into the gap of these two mass ranges and are physically unable to form from direct star collapse and are incredibly rare. Astrophysicists reckon these rare types of black holes grow from merging with others that are similar in size - like our most recent collision event. 3 What is a black hole? The key facts Here's what you need to know... A black hole is a region of space where absolutely nothing can escape That's because they have extremely strong gravitational effects, which means once something goes into a black hole, it can't come back out They get their name because even light can't escape once it's been sucked in – which is why a black hole is completely dark What is an event horizon? There has to be a point at which you're so close to a black hole you can't escape Otherwise, literally everything in the universe would have been sucked into one The point at which you can no longer escape from a black hole's gravitational pull is called the event horizon The event horizon varies between different black holes, depending on their mass and size What is a singularity? The gravitational singularity is the very centre of a black hole It's a one-dimensional point that contains an incredibly large mass in an infinitely small space At the singularity, space-time curves infinitely, and the gravitational pull is infinitely strong Conventional laws of physics stop applying at this point How are black holes created? Most black holes are made when a supergiant star dies This happens when stars run out of fuel – like hydrogen – to burn, causing the star to collapse When this happens, gravity pulls the centre of the star inwards quickly and collapses into a tiny ball It expands and contracts until one final collapse, causing part of the star to collapse inwards thanks to gravity, and the rest of the star to explode outwards The remaining central ball is extremely dense, and if it's especially dense, you get a black hole
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Science
- Yahoo
Scientists have detected the largest black hole merger yet. What it is and why it matters
It was a bump in the night. A big one. On Nov. 23, 2023, waves from a colossal merger of two black holes reached Earth and were picked up by the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA Collaboration, a group that detects these sort of mergers through gravitational waves. And these black holes were chunky, coming in at 100 and 140 times the mass of the sun. But the final merger produced something even more impressive: another black hole that is more than 225 times the mass of the sun, astronomers revealed today. Astronomers are excited about this merger because it's unusual. Most of these kinds of mergers detected thus far through gravitational waves have been between 10 and 40 times the sun, said Sophie Bini, a postdoctoral researcher at Caltech who is part of the group. WATCH | Scientists detect gravitational waves for 1st time: "We detected the first gravitational wave 10 years ago, and since then, we have already found more than 300 events. So it's really an exciting [time]," Bini said. "But this event in particular is very interesting because it's the most massive one." Gravitational waves are ripples in space-time that can only be detected by extremely sensitive instruments, like the ones from the collaboration, which are located across the United States, Japan and Italy. The first gravitational wave was detected in 2015 and announced by astronomers in 2016. The other interesting discovery of this detection — called GW231123 — is that the pair appear to have been spinning extremely quickly. "The black holes appear to be spinning very rapidly — near the limit allowed by [Albert] Einstein's theory of general relativity," Charlie Hoy at the University of Portsmouth said in a statement. "That makes the signal difficult to model and interpret. It's an excellent case study for pushing forward the development of our theoretical tools." Understanding black holes Not all black holes are created equal. There are supermassive black holes that can be tens of thousands to billions of times the sun's mass and lie at the centre of galaxies. The Milky Way, for example, has a black hole at its centre, called Sagittarius A* — or Sgr A* — that is roughly four million times the mass of the sun. Then there are stellar-mass black holes, which can be from a few times the mass of the sun to tens of times the mass. Or, some argue, a hundred of times its mass. These form when a massive star runs out of fuel and explodes in a spectacular fashion, an event called a supernova. But then there are those that lie somewhere in between the two, called intermediate black holes. Finding these in-betweens has proved difficult for astronomers. This new merger lies within what astronomers call the "mass gap" between stellar-mass and supermassive black holes. Gobbling up stars It's not quite clear why these two black holes were so much heavier than what astronomers have previously detected. One theory is that each of the pair itself was the result of two black holes merging. But that's not the only theory. Priya Natarajan, professor of physics and the chair of astronomy at Yale University, studies supermassive black holes. Though these two black holes are piddly compared to the ones she studies, she says she is excited about the recent detection. "I think this is super exciting for two reasons. First is the heaviness of the individual black holes before they actually merge," said Natarajan, who was not involved with the findings. "So the fact is that, you know, normal stellar processes that give you these stellar-mass remnant black holes, it's pretty hard to imagine, like, getting to 100 and 140 in one go." But she has another theory on how these two unusual black holes could have formed. In 2014, she co-authored a paper that suggested black holes could grow rapidly in the early universe by first going supernova and then by gobbling up stars in a nascent star cluster, à la Pac-Man. More gas means larger black holes. But she says in 2021, she realized this could happen later in the more recent universe, as well. "The only thing that is different is there's not as much gas," she said. "So I actually showed that if there's not that much gas, you could start with something that's one or ten times the mass of the sun. It could maybe reach 100.… If there's little more gas, it could be 1,000." So this new finding could open up a new avenue for cosmologists like herself to explore. The next thing she'd like to see is a better way to locate these mergers. For the recent detection, there is an estimate that it occurred anywhere from two to 13 billion light years away. Now, why are these findings important? It's about the human connection with the universe, Natarajan said. "I think from the moment that as Neanderthals we stood upright and we were able to look at the night sky, we were fascinated with the regularity of the night sky, as well as the sort of cosmic drama that's going on, right? You see stars exploding, you see eclipses, you see night and day, you see seasonal changes. And I think it speaks to a fundamental curiosity that we as humans have," she said. "I think that knowing our place in the universe is a question that's deeply fundamental to us. And it always has been."
CBC
4 days ago
- Science
- CBC
Scientists have detected the largest black hole merger yet. What it is and why it matters
It was a bump in the night. A big one. On Nov. 23, 2023, waves from a colossal merger of two black holes reached Earth and were picked up by the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA Collaboration, a group that detects these sort of mergers through gravitational waves. And these black holes were chunky, coming in at 100 and 140 times the mass of the sun. But the final merger produced something even more impressive: another black hole that is more than 225 times the mass of the sun, astronomers revealed today. Astronomers are excited about this merger because it's unusual. Most of these kinds of mergers detected thus far through gravitational waves have been between 10 and 40 times the sun, said Sophie Bini, a postdoctoral researcher at Caltech who is part of the group. WATCH | Scientists detect gravitational waves for 1st time: Scientists detect gravitational waves for 1st time 9 years ago Duration 0:51 "We detected the first gravitational wave 10 years ago, and since then, we have already found more than 300 events. So it's really an exciting [time]," Bini said. "But this event in particular is very interesting because it's the most massive one." Gravitational waves are ripples in space-time that can only be detected by extremely sensitive instruments, like the ones from the collaboration, which are located across the United States, Japan and Italy. The first gravitational wave was detected in 2015 and announced by astronomers in 2016. The other interesting discovery of this detection — called GW231123 — is that the pair appear to have been spinning extremely quickly. "The black holes appear to be spinning very rapidly — near the limit allowed by [Albert] Einstein's theory of general relativity," Charlie Hoy at the University of Portsmouth said in a statement. "That makes the signal difficult to model and interpret. It's an excellent case study for pushing forward the development of our theoretical tools." Understanding black holes Not all black holes are created equal. There are supermassive black holes that can be tens of thousands to billions of times the sun's mass and lie at the centre of galaxies. The Milky Way, for example, has a black hole at its centre, called Sagittarius A* — or Sgr A* — that is roughly four million times the mass of the sun. Then there are stellar-mass black holes, which can be from a few times the mass of the sun to tens of times the mass. Or, some argue, a hundred of times its mass. These form when a massive star runs out of fuel and explodes in a spectacular fashion, an event called a supernova. But then there are those that lie somewhere in between the two, called intermediate black holes. Finding these in-betweens has proved difficult for astronomers. This new merger lies within what astronomers call the "mass gap" between stellar-mass and supermassive black holes. Gobbling up stars It's not quite clear why these two black holes were so much heavier than what astronomers have previously detected. One theory is that each of the pair itself was the result of two black holes merging. But that's not the only theory. Priya Natarajan, professor of physics and the chair of astronomy at Yale University, studies supermassive black holes. Though these two black holes are piddly compared to the ones she studies, she says she is excited about the recent detection. "I think this is super exciting for two reasons. First is the heaviness of the individual black holes before they actually merge," said Natarajan, who was not involved with the findings. "So the fact is that, you know, normal stellar processes that give you these stellar-mass remnant black holes, it's pretty hard to imagine, like, getting to 100 and 140 in one go." But she has another theory on how these two unusual black holes could have formed. In 2014, she co-authored a paper that suggested black holes could grow rapidly in the early universe by first going supernova and then by gobbling up stars in a nascent star cluster, à la Pac-Man. More gas means larger black holes. But she says in 2021, she realized this could happen later in the more recent universe, as well. "The only thing that is different is there's not as much gas," she said. "So I actually showed that if there's not that much gas, you could start with something that's one or ten times the mass of the sun. It could maybe reach 100.… If there's little more gas, it could be 1,000." So this new finding could open up a new avenue for cosmologists like herself to explore. The next thing she'd like to see is a better way to locate these mergers. For the recent detection, there is an estimate that it occurred anywhere from two to 13 billion light years away. Now, why are these findings important? It's about the human connection with the universe, Natarajan said. "I think from the moment that as Neanderthals we stood upright and we were able to look at the night sky, we were fascinated with the regularity of the night sky, as well as the sort of cosmic drama that's going on, right? You see stars exploding, you see eclipses, you see night and day, you see seasonal changes. And I think it speaks to a fundamental curiosity that we as humans have," she said. "I think that knowing our place in the universe is a question that's deeply fundamental to us. And it always has been."
