Science

13257 readers

26 users here now

Subscribe to see new publications and popular science coverage of current research on your homepage

founded 5 years ago

MODERATORS

MinutePhrase@lemmy.ml

Brightest and fastest-growing: astronomers identify record-breaking quasar (www.eso.org)

submitted 9 months ago by rvlobato@lemmy.ml to c/science@lemmy.ml

3 comments fedilink hide all child comments

crosspostato da: https://lemmy.ml/post/12123473

Using the European Southern Observatory’s (ESO) Very Large Telescope (VLT), astronomers have characterised a bright quasar, finding it to be not only the brightest of its kind, but also the most luminous object ever observed. Quasars are the bright cores of distant galaxies and they are powered by supermassive black holes. The black hole in this record-breaking quasar is growing in mass by the equivalent of one Sun per day, making it the fastest-growing black hole to date

top 3 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old

[–] Shdwdrgn@mander.xyz 5 points 9 months ago (1 children)

It's amazing to think the light emitted from this object is nearly 8 billion years older than our solar system! That is quite the journey.

[–] xilliah@beehaw.org 1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I like to imagine a photon 'experiencing' being emitted and absorbed at exactly the same moment. The entire trip was instant.

[–] Shdwdrgn@mander.xyz 2 points 9 months ago

Kinda like "Yay I'm born!" -- SPLAT

Seems like traveling fully at the speed of light would be a strange experience. Literally an infinite amount of time could pass for the rest of the universe and you would have missed everything. The universe might not even still exist by the time you pulled back on the throttle.