Astronomers led by Josep Marti find Milky Way's 1st microblazar
Astronomers have spotted the Milky Way's very first microblazar, around 12,00 light-years from Earth.
Led by Josep Marti of the University of Jaen, Spain, they found this wild system (called IRAS 18293-0941) where a black hole feeding on material stripped from a massive companion star, with twin jets traveling at near-light speed.
Radio telescopes detect 100 light-year bubble
Microblazars are like the little siblings of blazars: they have regular-sized black holes instead of giant ones but still fire off powerful jets.
The team noticed the companion star's flickering, revealing it orbits the black hole every 11.4 days.
Radio telescopes then picked up a huge jet and even a bubble 100 light-years wide where that jet slams into space gas, creating high-energy gamma rays.
Josep Marti said this discovery offers a unique opportunity to study how such systems evolve. Pretty exciting stuff for anyone curious about black holes!