Peering deep into the heart of a blazar, astronomers have learned how particles are P being accelerated to close to the speed of light, racing away in a jet emanating from near the blazar’s monstrous supermassive black hole. Blazars are quasars seen head-on; a quasar is an extremely active galactic nucleus (AGN) that is powered by a black hole accreting vast amounts of matter. The matter circles around the black hole in an accretion disc, where conditions are so extreme that the disc shines at millions of degrees. Tightly entwined magnetic fields wrapped up in the disc are able
X-RAY VIEW SHOWS HOW SUPERMASSIVE BLACK HOLES SPEED UP PARTICLES IN JETS
Dec 29, 2022
3 minutes
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