A schematic showing how the X-ray flares from our supermassive black hole, Sgr A*, illuminate slices of a molecular cloud over time. Astronomers can use these X-ray echoes to construct 3D maps of molecular clouds, constrain the past flaring history of Sgr A*, and better understand the overall geometry of our galaxy’s center. (Image courtesy of S. Brunker/UConn)
Observed black hole spin over the history of the Universe, from past (left) to present (right). The thick colored dots show the observed spins of black holes – blue shows rotation in the same direction as the accretion disk, gray shows little or no rotation, and red shows rotation in the opposite direction. The green oval shows what would be expected from black hole growth by smooth accretion; the pink oval shows what would be expected from mergers (the illustrations on the right show the corresponding physical system. Most spin values are in the green area – especially in the early universe – suggesting that supermassive black holes are built up mostly from accretion. Image Credit: Left: Logan Fries and the SDSS collaboration; Top right: NASA, ESA, and The Hubble Heritage Team (STScI); Bottom right: NASA/CXC/M.Weiss
Congratulations to our outstanding students for producing such notable science results!
