Featured Video: Black Hole Eats Star

Credit: NRAO/AUI/NSF

What happens when a black hole has a star for dinner?

In this new video, Melissa Hoffman of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory takes us on a tour of one of the most disruptive events in Universe: a black hole ripping apart a nearby star.

Astronomers call these stellar deaths tidal disruption events, and only a few of them have been observed.

Using radio and infrared telescopes, including the National Science Foundation’s Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA), in 2018 an international team of astronomers witnessed this event in a pair of colliding galaxies called Arp 299.

Watch the video here.

Read the original press release about this finding here.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email
Images & Videos
About the Author:
Iris Nijman Public Information and News Manager

More News Related to Death and Birth of Stars

Stellar Explosions and Cosmic Chemistry
April 1, 2024

Astronomers have discovered the secrets of a starburst galaxy producing new stars at a rate much faster than our…
Mystery of Star Formation Revealed by Hearts of Molecular Clouds
January 8, 2024

An international team of astronomers has revealed mysterious star formation at the far edge of the galaxy M83. This research was presented today in a press conference at the 243rd meeting of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) in New Orleans, Louisiana. The research used several instruments operated by the National Science Foundation’s National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO), including the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA), and the Green Bank Telescope (GBT), along with the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan’s (NAOJ) Subaru Telescope and the NASA Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX).
NRAO in the press at AAS 243
January 8, 2024

New scientific results from the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), the Very Large Array (VLA), and Green Bank Observatory…
NRAO and GBO Results Presented at Multiple AAS 242 Press Conferences
June 4, 2023

New scientific results from the Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA), the Very Large Array (VLA), and the Green Bank Observatory (GBO) will be revealed at multiple press conferences during the 242nd meeting of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) from June 5-7, in Albuquerque, New Mexico.