Black holes keep 'burping up' stars they destroyed years earlier, and astronomers don't know why

L4sBot@lemmy.worldmod to Technology@lemmy.world – 304 points –
Black holes keep 'burping up' stars they destroyed years earlier, and astronomers don't know why
livescience.com

Black holes keep 'burping up' stars they destroyed years earlier, and astronomers don't know why::Years after ripping stars to shreds, 24 black holes suddenly flared up with radio waves in inexplicable 'burping' bouts. Half of all star-killing black holes may experience the same.

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It sounds like the matter isn't coming out of the black hole, but actually the accretion disc that is in the process of being sucked into the black hole so we aren't breaking the event horizon threshold as title suggests

we aren’t breaking the event horizon threshold as title suggests

It wouldn't be pop-sci if it didn't have a misleading clickbait title!

It couldn't be the actual black hole past the event horizon, right? It would logically seem that inescapable precludes burping or farting matter

This is my assumption. Clearly the accretion disk isn't the point of no return, or maybe stuff on the inside = past point of no return, stuff on the outside can get flung off?

Ok so black holes are just teleporters to other dimensions right?!

It's a one way teleporter to a single dimension, because you're entire mass will be a single imperceptible point.

But it's not a single point though, because blackholes with a different mass have different sizes, so it's more like a "maximum density" that can exist in this universe...

It's an oversimplification, but something with the mass of say, a human, will be crushed into a very very very very tiny space. A much smaller space than 0.1mm radius, which would hold Earth's moon's mass of 7.342×10^22 kg.

Yes... And something with the mass of the universe will crush into a significantly larger (yet comparatively tiny) volume of space... Thus, a black hole is basically the maximum density we can currently comprehend and theorize.

As far as i know the Mass of the black Hole is concentrated in the Center (singularity). But it is surouded by its schwarzschild Radius. Anything that enters it cant escape.

Time slows down as the mass approaches the center, so it just can never reach it. It’s stuck in time dilation approaching infinity.

That's what the current understanding of physics says. But given that there are singularities that come out of the math, all that really means is we don't actually know what happens inside a black hole.

Kind of like the lump that forms in my chest when I get a phone call

I equate it to a can of spray cheese. Small hole, puffy cheese.

I thought you were making this up, but apparently there actually is "cheese" that comes in a spray bottle.

What the wiki article does not explain, is why.

Some people put it on crackers but when I was growing up we always put it in the bugles chips.

That is also why I always thought people who pretended to have witch nails by wearing bugles were weird, I was always like “why would you put cheese all over your fingers…”.

Maybe it's just because I'm still shocked at the existence of this product, but I don't see why either of those use cases need cheese in a can instead of just cheese.

Partly it's convenience, but I think the main reason is you can get cheddar and bacon flavored spray cheese.

Real cheese takes a couple seconds to scoop or even slice. The can is as simple as flexing your finger, and an endless stream of “cheese” comes out!

They used to take them on dive trips and squirt it in the water and the fish would eat it. Some diver masters would play jokes and squirt it in other divers hair and the fish would start eating at their hair.

EASY CHEEEEESE!

There's a place in Philly that uses it as the cheese for their steak subs.

It's wrong, but they still do for some reason.

Bruh ez cheese on a Ritz or club cracker. If ur brain doesn't go nuts for that u don't have a single taste bud.

I don't know what it tastes like, but it looks like American cheese.

Is the flavour different from say, cheese whiz, a plastic cheese slice, or an unspiced queso?

It isn't spicy like cheese whiz. Have you ever had the little keebler lunch packs of crackers and cheese? They're like that. Flavor is close to a plastic cheese single I guess so yeah American cheese but the texture is different. If you can ever get a can I highly recommend it just for the fun of it.

It'll teleport you from the third dimension to the first dimension.

No indication that any of the returning matter ever made it beyond the event horizon but how wild would it be if matter can come back from that somehow, would shatter current understand of the phenom.

It would be amazing if that happened! We desperately need to be proven wrong somewhere if we want to develop a theory of quantum gravity.

1 more...

What if we're currently travelling through one right now and we forgot to turn the oven off

I wonder if it could be caused by other celestial bodies captured in the black hole's orbit. Some new mass approaches the accretion disk and the gravitational pull slingshots some of the disk's matter out.

For the forces required to "pull" the matter out, we would need another singularity, but even then, that wouldn't show this.

Maybe black holes sometimes momentarily change into white holes? 🤔

A white hole?

The Cat: So, what is it?

Kryten: I've never seen one before - no one has - but I'm guessing it's a white hole.

Rimmer: A white hole?

Kryten: Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. A black hole sucks time and matter out of the Universe; a white hole returns it.

Lister: So, that thing's spewing time...

Lister: [donning his fur-lined hat] ... back into the Universe?

Kryten: Precisely. That's why we're experiencing these curious time phenomena on board.

The Cat: So, what is it?

Kryten: I've never seen one before - no one has - but I'm guessing it's a white hole.

Rimmer: A white hole?

Kryten: Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. A black hole sucks time and matter out of the Universe; a white hole returns it.

Lister: [minus the hat] So, that thing's spewing time...

Lister: [donning his fur-lined hat, again] ... back into the Universe?

Kryten: Precisely. That's why we're experiencing these curious time phenomena on board.

Lister: What time phenomena?

Kryten: Like just then, when time repeated itself.

The Cat: So, what is it?

[Kryten, Rimmer, and Lister stare at Cat]

The Cat: Only joking.

-Red Dwarf

A white hole is a theorized antithesis to a black hole. While a black hole sucks matter in and destroys it, a white hole seemingly creates new matter and sprays it into the universe.

Afaik, we haven't actually observed one before. It's just a mathematical theory. But black holes used to be nothing more than theory, too.

Edit: I haven't seen Red Dwarf in so long, I didn't realize you were referencing it. 🤣

So that thing is spewing time back in to the universe?

those are the bad stars that are not wanted for the next universe that starts at the end of the black hole. our sun is definitely getting burped up in the future. :D

Cheers.

Burrrp

I'm a black hole, Morty! I'm black hole rick!

You’re being upvoted because your username combined with your comment genuinely contributes more to the conversation than the post to which you replied.

The post I replied to reminded me of the brain dead rick & morty fans who think they’re smarter then everyone else.

Gee, Rick, I-I think they prefer to be called African-American holes now, y'know?