NASA Images Massive Rings Around A Distant Black Hole

NASA is conducting observations of a black hole that is part of the binary system called V404 Cygni. The system is located 7800 light-years away from Earth, and the black hole is actively slurping up dust and material from its companion star. Its companion star is about half the mass of the Sun.

While we can't see the black hole itself, the material it's gathering from its companion star has formed into a disk around the black hole. The disc is visible because it is glowing in x-rays, leading to the name "x-ray binaries." The burst of x-rays from V404 Cygni was discovered on June 5, 2015, using the Swift Observatory.

The burst created high-energy rings resulting from something known as light echoes. The light echoes were produced when burst x-rays from the blackhole bounced off dust clouds between V404 Cygni and Earth. NASA notes that the dust clouds in space aren't like dust you might clean up around your home, but more like smoke made of tiny solid particles.

The image seen above is a new composite image in x-rays with data from the Chandra X-ray Observatory in light blue and optical data from the PAN-STARRS telescope showing stars in the field of view. NASA's image shows concentric rings created by x-rays emitted from V404 Cygni flares observed in 2015 reflected off different dust clouds.

NASA's image is simplified, showing only four of the eight rings. Scientists analyzed 50 observations made using Swift in 2015 conducted between June 30 and August 25. Chandra observed the system between July 11 and 25th of the same year. The rings are interesting because they allow astronomers to learn details about the black hole's behavior and the landscape between V404 Cygni and Earth.

NASA says the diameter of the rings in x-rays highlight distances to the dust clouds the light impacted. When the cloud is closer to Earth, rings appear to be larger and vice versa. Narrower rings indicate the x-ray burst lasted a shorter period of time compared to wider rings.