Supercomputer simulation explains the massive power of a jet black hole

Further confirmation of Einstein’s general theory of relativity.

The Messier 87 (M87) galaxy is located 55 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Virgo. It is a giant galaxy with 12,000 globular clusters, making it Milky WayThe 200 football teams look modest by comparison. that Black hole Of the six and a half billion solar masses, it is in the center of M87. It is the first black hole with an image, made in 2019 by the international research collaboration Event Horizon Telescope.

This black hole has a diameter (M87 *) plasma Close to the speed of light, the so-called relative plane, on the scale of 6000 light years. Perhaps the enormous energy needed to propel this jet comes from the black hole’s gravity, but how this jet forms and what makes it stable at such an enormous distance isn’t entirely clear yet.

The black hole M87* attracts matter spinning in a disk into smaller orbits until the black hole swallows it. The jet is launched from the center of the accretion disk around M87, and theoretical physicists from Goethe University have designed this area in great detail, along with scientists from Europe, the United States and China.

They used highly sophisticated 3D supercomputer simulations that used up to a million CPU hours per simulation, while simultaneously solving Albert Einstein’s equations of general relativity, James Maxwell’s equations of electromagnetism, and Leonhard Euler’s fluid dynamics equations.

Along the magnetic field lines, the particles accelerate so efficiently that in the case of M 87 they form jets up to 6000 light-years in size. Credit: Alejandro Cruz Osorio

The result was a model in which the calculated values ​​of temperatures, material density, and magnetic fields matched remarkably what was derived from astronomical observations. Based on this, the scientists were able to trace the complex motion of photons in the curved space-time of the plane’s interior and translate it into radio images. They can then compare these computer images with observations made with different radio telescopes and satellites over the past three decades.

Doctor. Alejandro Cruz Osorio, lead author of the study, notes that “Our theoretical model of the electromagnetic emission and jet morphology of M87 surprisingly matches observations in the radio, optical and infrared spectra. This tells us that the M87 supermassive black hole* is likely in a high orbit and that the plasma is magnetised. Highly in the level, accelerating the particles to a range of thousands of light years.

Professor Luciano Rizzola, Institute for Theoretical Physics at Goethe University Frankfurt, comments: “The fact that the images we calculated are so close to astronomical observations is another important confirmation that Einstein’s general theory of relativity is the most accurate and natural explanation for the existence of supermassive black holes at the center of galaxies. While not While there is still room for alternative explanations, the results of our study narrowed this space much smaller.”

Reference: “Latest active and morphological models of the M87 launch site” by Alejandro Cruz Osorio, Christian M Fromm, Yusuke Mizuno, Antonios Nathaniel Ziri Yunus, Oliver Borth, Jordi Davilar, Hino Falk, Michael Kramer, and Luciano Rizzola, November 4, 2021, natural astronomy.
DOI: 10.1038 / s41550-021-01506-w