spacetoday.net: Astronomers produce first image of a black hole

Astronomers produce first image of a black hole

Posted: Sun, Apr 14, 2019, 10:34 AM ET (1434 GMT)
Astronomers unveiled Wednesday the first direct image of a black hole. The image, of the supermassive black hole in the center of the galaxy M87 55 million light-years away, was taken using a global network of radio telescopes called the Event Horizon Telescope. The black hole is about the size of our solar system and weighs 6.5 billion times the mass of the sun. It appears in the image as a dark circle against the bright background of the accretion disk, whose appearance is warped by the black hole's intense gravity. The observations closely match theoretical models of black holes.