Astronomers Catch Supermassive Black Hole in the Act of “Waking Up”

Astronomers using the U.S. National Science Foundation’s Very Long Baseline Array (NSF VLBA) and U.S. National Science Foundation’s Very Large Array (NSF VLA) have caught a supermassive black hole in the act of awakening from a long slumber, providing an unprecedented glimpse into the earliest stages of black hole activity.

Decorative Image

Milky Way’s Black Hole Was “Birth Cry” of Radio Astronomy

The new image of the black hole at the center of our Milky Way galaxy made with the Event Horizon Telescope brings radio astronomy back to its celestial birthplace. The EHT image provides the closest look yet at the region from which radio waves from beyond the Earth were first detected in 1932 — by Karl Jansky, the father of radio astronomy.

Invisible Colors: Why Astronomers Use Different Radio Bands

Radio light is invisible to our eyes, so it’s easy to think of all radio light as the same. But radio is filled with colors, just as the colors of visible light we can see, and radio astronomy is at its most powerful when we use all the colors of its rainbow.