COLLECTION NAME:
NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day Collection
Record
Title:
Evidence for Frame Dragging Black Holes
Explanation:
Gravity can do more than floor you. According to recent measurements [ ftp://ftp.hq.nasa.g… ] of a star system thought to contain a black hole [ http://wonka.physic… ], it can spin you too. This effect, called frame-dragging [ http://www.enews.co… ], is most prominent near massive, fast spinning objects. Now, a team led by W. Cui [ mailto:cui@space.mit.edu ] (MIT [ http://web.mit.edu/… ]) has used the orbiting Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer [ http://heasarc.gsfc… ] to search for it near a system thought to contain a black hole [ http://antwrp.gsfc.… ]. Cui's team claim that matter in this system gets caught up and spun around the black hole [ http://physics7.ber… ] at just the rate expected [ http://adsabs.harva… ] from frame-dragging. Such discoveries help scientists better understand gravity [ http://www.ncsa.uiu… ] itself.
Credit and Copyright:
J. Bergeron [ mailto: joe at joebergeron.com ], Sky & Telescope Magazine
keyword:
X-ray
facet_where:
Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC)
facet_what:
Explorer
UID:
SPD-APOD-ap971107
