NASA's Chandra X-ray Center has led a project to sonicate waves from two of the most famous black holes so that we can hear them naturally.
The process of sonication is defined as converting astronomical data into sound waves that can be listened to, which is useful - as a different point of view - in studying black holes, their impact and their surroundings as well.
Voices of the Great Persians
According to a statement issued by the official platform of the Chandra space observatory, since 2003, scientists have discovered that the black hole in the center of the Perseus group of galaxies releases pressure waves that cause ripples in the hot gas in the galaxy cluster. These ripples can be translated into Musical note.
The researchers extracted the sound waves from those ripples, then reconstructed them and raised their frequency to 144-288 quadrillion times higher than their original frequency, to be audible to the human ear (a quadrillion is a million billion).
Another black hole that has caught the attention of researchers from the Chandra X-ray Center is Messier 87 (M87), which gained a lot of fame several years ago, because it was the first black hole in history that we could see an image of.
But this sonication is unlike its predecessor, converting optical data from telescopes as diverse as Chandra and the Hubble Space Telescope and radio waves from the Atacama Millimeter Array in Chile, then converting that data into varying pitches of sound.
Echoes of black holes
هذه ليست أول مرة ينتهج العلماء الصوتنة وسيلة لفهم أعمق للأجرام السماوية، لكن مؤخرا اهتمت الكثير من المراكز البحثية بالأمر، فعلى سبيل المثال نشر باحثون من معهد ماساشوستس للتكنولوجيا (MIT) دراسة في 4 مايو/أيار الجاري بدورية "أستروفيزيكال جورنال" (The Astrophysical Journal) قاموا خلالها بدراسة الصدى في محيط الثقب الأسود.
This research team has created a new tool called the Reverberation Machine that combs satellite data for signals of echoes from black holes in the Milky Way.
In their research, this team discovered 8 new reciprocating black hole binaries, which are systems with a star orbiting the black hole, sometimes eroding by its presence.
According to a press release issued by the institute, this team used X-ray echoes to map the area around the black hole in the same way that bats use to navigate their surroundings, as they emit sound waves that bounce back and return to them as an echo, so they know their location, and in a similar way this research team uses the echoes of X-rays emitted The black hole bounces back when it collides with the companion star.
This type of technology is useful in achieving a better understanding of the evolution of black holes and their origins billions of years ago, and because the role of black holes in the evolution of galaxies is a prominent question in modern astrophysics, these new mechanisms deepen our understanding of the evolution of the universe and its galaxies.