A group of international astronomers, including experts from the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA) in Pune, has made an exciting discovery about how black holes and stars interact. Their research focuses on a star called AT2019qiz, which orbits a massive black hole and crashes into the debris of a destroyed star approximately every 48 hours. This collision causes bursts of X-rays to be emitted.
The Discovery of Tidal Disruption Events In 2019, astronomers detected the first signs of a star that came too close to a black hole and was torn apart by its gravitational pull. The remnants of this star formed a disk around the black hole, similar to a graveyard of stars. Over time, this disk grew and crossed paths with another star that had been safe until then. As this star repeatedly collides with the debris disk, it produces X-ray bursts that were captured by NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory.
Matt Nicholl, the lead author of the study published in Nature, explained the phenomenon: “Imagine a diver repeatedly jumping into a pool and creating a splash each time. The star is like the diver, and the disk is the pool. Every time the star hits the surface, it creates a big ‘splash’ of gas and X-rays.”
Connecting Two Cosmic Events This groundbreaking finding sheds light on two previously unrelated cosmic phenomena. Scientists have observed instances where objects near black holes are torn apart in a single burst of light, known as tidal disruption events (TDEs).
Recently, astronomers discovered a new type of bright flash from the centers of galaxies, called quasi-periodic eruptions (QPEs), which are detected only in X-rays. Although these flashes are linked to supermassive black holes, their cause remained a mystery until this research.
Dheeraj Pasham, a co-author from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, stated, “There has been intense speculation about a connection between these events, and now we have evidence that they are related. It’s like getting a cosmic two-for-one in solving mysteries.”
The Role of AstroSat in the Discovery The study involved multiple space observatories, including NASA's Chandra, Hubble Space Telescope, NICER, and Swift, along with ISRO's AstroSat. AstroSat played a vital role in confirming the findings about the star AT2019qiz.
Gulab Dewangan from IUCAA noted, “India’s AstroSat mission has unique UV/X-ray capabilities for studying these events. AstroSat’s Soft X-ray Telescope and Ultra-Violet Imaging Telescope (UVIT) both observed AT2019qiz, but the eruptions were detected only in X-rays. Future observations in X-ray and UV will allow us to explore their nature further.”
This research not only enhances our understanding of how stars and black holes interact but also deepens our knowledge of cosmic events. The collaboration between international astronomers and Indian research institutions highlights the global effort to uncover the universe's mysteries.
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