At the center of the galaxy, millions of stars whirl in orbits around a supermassive black hole that can take anywhere from a few hours for stars close to the event horizon of the black hole to thousands of years for their distant neighbors, according to a new study that included scientists at the Institute for Advanced Study. The nature of the dance—how the stars interact collectively through their gravitational forces—can vary from galaxy to galaxy.
“The Galaxy Report” connects you to headline news on the science, technology, discoveries, people and events changing our knowledge of our Galaxy and beyond.
“The Galaxy Report” connects you to headline news on the science, technology, discoveries, people and events changing our knowledge of our Galaxy and beyond.
“The first galaxies in the early universe may illuminate what type of dark matter we have today,” says Mark Vogelsberger, associate professor of physics in MIT’s Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research. “Either we see this filament pattern, and fuzzy dark matter is plausible, or we don’t, and we can rule that model out. We now have a blueprint for how to do this.”
