The Event Horizon Telescope, an international collaboration of eight radio telescopes distributed over the planet, captured the image of the supermassive black hole residing the center of the galaxy M87 located 55 million light years from Earth. The central black hole has 6 billion times the mass of the Sun, has an event horizon with about the size of the solar system and is rotating. This groundbreaking observation, only possible due to the existing state of art technology, shows the image of the shadow of a black hole illuminated by incandescent matter around it and confirms the theoretical and numerical predictions initiated in 1973 by the American physicist James Bardeen.
Since its foundation, the Center for Astrophysics and Gravitation (CENTRA) of IST has professors, researchers and students working in the theory of black holes, namely, in phenomena occurring at the vicinity of the event horizon and in the optical distortions provoked by lens effects due to the intense gravitational field of a black hole. CENTRA congratulates the Event Horizon Telescope for this unprecedented discovery. Below, see the photos of the CENTRA meeting organized by CENTRA member Taishi Ikeda to watch live at the IST Physics Department seminar room the Event Horizon Telescope press conference.
For more information see: https://eventhorizontelescope.org/
