The iconic image of the photon ring and the shadow of the black hole in the center of the elliptical galaxy M87, published by the Event Horizon Telescope on April 10, 2019 [EHT Collaboration]

Rotating Black Holes, the Most Powerful Energy Generators in the Universe

A rotating black hole creates around itself a space-time dragging effect that also twists the light emitted in its vicinity. From the degree of twisting of the light, it is possible with appropriate analysis techniques to trace the sense and speed of rotation of the black hole. Analyzing through these techniques the images of the supermassive black hole at the center of the elliptical galaxy M87 published last year, a team of researchers has established that it is a Kerr black hole, that is, a rotating black hole, and that the rotational energy stored in it is simply immense

The most important scientific image of 2019 in the astronomical field was undoubtedly the shadow of the 6.5-billion-solar-mass black hole at the center of the elliptical galaxy M87, published on April 10 by the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) Collaboration. To produce that image, based on observations made in 2017 by a network of eight radio telescopes spread over several…