In a piece of ground-breaking discovery, astronomers have found the closest black hole to us so far. It’s a part of a binary system called Gaia BH1, with a
sun-like star orbiting it. Initially, astronomers thought it was just a regular binary system of two celestial objects. But when they studied the star’s properties and how it goes around the black hole, they quickly realized something unusual was happening there. They had never seen a black hole and a star locked in a binary system like this before. This discovery has led us to an entirely new concept in astronomy that we didn’t know before.

So how did astronomers find out it’s a black hole in that system? What’s so special about the closest black hole we have discovered to date? Finally, and most importantly, what has this discovery contributed to physics and astronomy?

The 42nd episode of the series answers all these questions.

Research Paper: https://arxiv.org/pdf/2209.06833.pdf

RESOURCES:

Footage: NASA/ESA/ESO/Hubble, Pond5, Envato Elements, VideoBlocks
Music: Motion Elements, Envato Elements

Created By: Rishabh Nakra and Shreejaya Karantha
Narrated By: Jeffrey Smith