Deep Field — Black HolesThe densest objects we know of, and the instruments built to watch them: X-ray observatories, interferometers, and the Event Horizon Telescope.https://deepfield.news/feeds/black-holes.xml2026-08-12T18:00:07ZDeep FieldAggregated from the publishers named in each entry. Rights remain with them.https://deepfield.news/icon-180.pngWhat if there's a star inside a black hole?tag:deepfield.news,2026-08-12:story/a2d7b16195ec02e32026-08-12T18:00:07Z2026-08-12T18:00:07ZPhys.orgPhys.orgThere is a question that often comes up at every public talk I do, and I have never had a good answer to it—well, not an entirely confident one. What's inside a black hole? The textbook reply is a singularity. Cross the event horizon, and everything falls inward to a point of…Headline and summary from Phys.org; follow the link for the full article.Famous oddball quasar isn't X-ray weak after all, astronomers saytag:deepfield.news,2026-08-12:story/e2a88cc0e7838f5d2026-08-12T16:40:01Z2026-08-12T16:40:01ZPhys.orgPhys.orgFor more than two decades, the quasar PHL 1811 has been considered the prototype of a rare class of "intrinsically X-ray weak" quasars, thought to produce unusually little X-ray radiation. But in 2024, the Einstein Probe spacecraft caught the object in a bright X-ray flare. In a…Headline and summary from Phys.org; follow the link for the full article.Farthest 'black hole star' ever found could help solve the James Webb Space Telescope's little red dot mysterytag:deepfield.news,2026-08-12:story/e8887cbf9c2e43812026-08-12T15:05:00Z2026-08-12T15:05:00ZSpace.comSpace.comA distant black hole star is providing strong evidence that these objects lie at the hearts of the mysterious little red dots found shortly after the Big Bang by the James Webb Space Telescope.Headline and summary from Space.com; follow the link for the full article.Mirage or miracle? JWST finds earliest known 'black hole star' at cosmic dawntag:deepfield.news,2026-08-12:story/7f5f01e78d22e80c2026-08-12T15:00:08Z2026-08-12T15:00:08ZPhys.orgPhys.orgLittle red dots have puzzled astronomers since their discovery in James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) data from the universe's deep past. Their "powering engines" might resemble a newly discovered phenomenon dubbed a "black hole star"—an early, rapidly growing black hole wrapped…Headline and summary from Phys.org; follow the link for the full article.Three supermassive black holes discovered in a single galaxy for the first timetag:deepfield.news,2026-08-12:story/86fcbdf94a7f2c552026-08-12T13:40:14Z2026-08-12T13:40:14ZPhys.orgPhys.orgAn international team of astronomers led by the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics has identified three actively accreting supermassive black holes in the galaxy J0148-4214. Matter is falling into the black holes from accretion disks surrounding them.Headline and summary from Phys.org; follow the link for the full article.Physicists extend Hawking’s black hole laws to dynamical objectstag:deepfield.news,2026-08-12:story/5d8b590878eca1082026-08-12T11:00:18Z2026-08-12T11:00:18ZPhysics WorldPhysics WorldThermodynamics can describe the mechanics of black holes that change over timeHeadline and summary from Physics World; follow the link for the full article.Scientists find 2 million active black holes, exploding stars and more, nearly doubling our view of the high-energy universetag:deepfield.news,2026-08-11:story/174862e8b73cde392026-08-11T20:00:00Z2026-08-11T20:00:00ZSpace.comSpace.comAstronomers have nearly doubled the number of known cosmic X-ray sources.Headline and summary from Space.com; follow the link for the full article.High-Sensitivity Methodologies to Detect Radio-Band Gravitational Wavestag:deepfield.news,2026-08-11:story/c683550fc7d404292026-08-11T16:00:51Z2026-08-11T16:00:51ZAAS NovaAAS NovaWei Hong et al 2026 ApJS 284 51 Resonance between gravitational waves and magnetic fields may produce a faint radio signal in pulsar magnetospheres; current searches are approaching the sensitivity necessary to detect this signal.Headline and summary from AAS Nova; follow the link for the full article.Black holes older than the Big Bang could explain dark mattertag:deepfield.news,2026-08-11:story/e93d467beef8da8b2026-08-11T10:14:58Z2026-08-11T10:14:58ZScienceDailyScienceDailySome black holes roaming the Universe today may actually be older than the Big Bang. A new cosmic “bounce” model suggests the Universe expanded from an earlier contracting phase, allowing ancient black holes to survive the transition as cosmic fossils. These relics could…Headline and summary from ScienceDaily; follow the link for the full article.Thermal imaging technique helps overcome a major problem for gravitational-wave astronomytag:deepfield.news,2026-08-11:story/0cfa1b16307d40dc2026-08-11T08:00:10Z2026-08-11T08:00:10ZPhysics WorldPhysics WorldCorrecting heat-induced distortions in interferometer mirrors will dramatically increase the sensitivity of gravitational-wave detectorsHeadline and summary from Physics World; follow the link for the full article.Webb reveals dust and water surviving in the extreme environment around the Milky Way’s central black holetag:deepfield.news,2026-08-11:story/f5fa11c710d30a412026-08-11T08:00:00Z2026-08-11T08:00:00ZESA/WebbESA/WebbUsing the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope, an international team of astronomers have discovered that dust and water can form and survive surprisingly close to the supermassive black hole at the centre of our Milky Way galaxy. The observations reveal that the evolved star…Headline and summary from ESA/Webb; follow the link for the full article.Seven Needles, 800,000 Haystackstag:deepfield.news,2026-08-10:story/877f4a48c340c9372026-08-10T23:07:11Z2026-08-10T23:07:11ZUniverse TodayUniverse TodayA quasar is a supermassive black hole in the act of feeding, and it’s so bright that it drowns out the galaxy it sits in. That is a nuisance if you want to weigh the galaxy and weighing it is exactly what you need to do to understand how black holes and the host galaxies grew up…Headline and summary from Universe Today; follow the link for the full article.How gravitational waves transformed our universetag:deepfield.news,2026-08-10:story/b8d0d2ff707a0e502026-08-10T18:14:37Z2026-08-10T18:14:37ZAstronomy MagazineAstronomy MagazineSome 1.3 billion years ago, when multicellular organisms were just emerging on Earth and life was still confined to the ocean, two behemoth black holes smashed together in a far-flung galaxy. The collision was so powerful that it jolted the universe, creating a ripple in the…Headline and summary from Astronomy Magazine; follow the link for the full article.Smoking-Gun Signatures of Bounce Cosmology from Echoes of Relic Gravitational Wavestag:deepfield.news,2026-08-10:story/a7e50f7c467eba742026-08-10T16:00:22Z2026-08-10T16:00:22ZAAS NovaAAS NovaMian Zhu and Yi-Fu Cai 2026 ApJL 1004 L34 In a cosmology framework that proposes the universe began with a period of contraction before the Big Bang, researchers find that high-frequency gravitational waves oscillate in a way that is potentially detectable.Headline and summary from AAS Nova; follow the link for the full article.A star’s violent death exposed a hidden supermassive black holetag:deepfield.news,2026-08-06:story/8edb997751a733d22026-08-06T12:16:32Z2026-08-06T12:16:32ZScienceDailyScienceDailyA supermassive black hole has been found lurking about 30,000 light-years from the center of its galaxy—the first dormant black hole detected so far from a galactic core. It revealed itself only after shredding a passing star and producing a brief, brilliant flare. Astronomers…Headline and summary from ScienceDaily; follow the link for the full article.Isolating Sgr A East: The First Uncontaminated X-Ray Maps of a Galactic Center Supernova Remnanttag:deepfield.news,2026-08-04:story/589b1101a91e926d2026-08-04T16:00:08Z2026-08-04T16:00:08ZAAS NovaAAS NovaMayura Balakrishnan et al 2026 ApJ 1003 128 Sgr A East strongly overlaps with plasma associated with the Milky Way’s central supermassive black hole, but new efforts to disentangle this emission have successfully isolated the remnant’s emission.Headline and summary from AAS Nova; follow the link for the full article.Physicists find unexpected connection between black hole mergers and thermodynamicstag:deepfield.news,2026-08-04:story/c861ae0c5fca305a2026-08-04T13:05:44Z2026-08-04T13:05:44ZPhysics WorldPhysics WorldProperties of a merger remnant can be predicted using a simple entropy-maximization principleHeadline and summary from Physics World; follow the link for the full article.Tiny black holes may be secretly exploding stars across the Milky Waytag:deepfield.news,2026-08-01:story/29bdd39117299cb32026-08-01T13:33:41Z2026-08-01T13:33:41ZScienceDailyScienceDailyPrimordial black holes may occasionally pass through white dwarf stars and trigger enormous Type Ia supernova explosions. Researchers found that these events could explain chemical patterns seen in supernova remnants, nearby explosions, and stars across the Milky Way.Headline and summary from ScienceDaily; follow the link for the full article.Discovery of a Featureless Tidal Disruption Event at z ∼ 1 with the Wide Field Survey Telescopetag:deepfield.news,2026-07-31:story/a0cb35cfa4f2d3a32026-07-31T16:00:40Z2026-07-31T16:00:40ZAAS NovaAAS NovaJiazheng Zhu et al 2026 ApJL 1004 L10 Discovered just 6 billion years after the Big Bang, AT2025wet is the highest-redshift non-jetted tidal disruption event known, allowing researchers to probe the missing-energy puzzle.Headline and summary from AAS Nova; follow the link for the full article.Black holes may spit out nearly as much matter as they swallowtag:deepfield.news,2026-07-31:story/d0176d3431eb4aa32026-07-31T08:18:29Z2026-07-31T08:18:29ZScienceDailyScienceDailyA black hole observed during a dramatic 2023 eruption did not simply devour gas from its nearby companion star. It also expelled large amounts of material through powerful jets and winds, even after the outburst had nearly faded. The results suggest black holes may continue…Headline and summary from ScienceDaily; follow the link for the full article.Monthly Roundup: The Fourth Catalog of Gravitational Wave Events from LIGO, Virgo, and KAGRAtag:deepfield.news,2026-07-29:story/46926b0571c2ffc42026-07-29T16:00:40Z2026-07-29T16:00:40ZAAS NovaAAS NovaA recent Focus Issue of the Astrophysical Journal Letters introduces the fourth version of the gravitational wave transient catalog from the LIGO, Virgo, and KAGRA collaborations.Headline and summary from AAS Nova; follow the link for the full article.Blazing like 10 billion suns: NASA’s Swift sees a wandering black hole devouring a startag:deepfield.news,2026-07-28:story/4e7634c5bfbbd4002026-07-28T05:54:39Z2026-07-28T05:54:39ZScienceDailyScienceDailyNASA’s Swift Observatory observed a supermassive black hole ripping apart a star more than 30,000 light-years from the center of a distant galaxy. The extraordinary flare briefly outshone its entire host galaxy in ultraviolet light and revealed a black hole about a million times…Headline and summary from ScienceDaily; follow the link for the full article.First-Generation Stars Provide Better Fit than a Black Hole for Early-Universe Gas Clumptag:deepfield.news,2026-07-27:story/73d50a0edc2f49982026-07-27T16:00:42Z2026-07-27T16:00:42ZAAS NovaAAS NovaWhat powers the prominent helium emission from Hebe, a gas clump seen just 450 million years after the Big Bang?Headline and summary from AAS Nova; follow the link for the full article.Trends in the Population of Binary Black Holes Following the Fourth Gravitational-Wave Transient Catalog: A Data-Driven Analysistag:deepfield.news,2026-07-27:story/3b2521fa014d5d832026-07-27T16:00:33Z2026-07-27T16:00:33ZAAS NovaAAS NovaNir Guttman et al 2026 ApJ 996 144 An analysis of the fourth gravitational wave catalog supports the existence of a gap at 45 solar masses in the secondary black hole mass distribution, among other findings.Headline and summary from AAS Nova; follow the link for the full article.Euclid opens a new window on the first billion years of cosmic historytag:deepfield.news,2026-07-25:story/1e415fe2b3c12fbd2026-07-25T17:09:44Z2026-07-25T17:09:44ZAstronomy NowAstronomy NowOne of the biggest mysteries in modern astronomy is how the Universe managed to grow enormous black holes so quickly.Headline and summary from Astronomy Now; follow the link for the full article.Researchers Spot Hydrocarbons Surprisingly Close to a Quasar Pairtag:deepfield.news,2026-07-22:story/88da6405e1e2d9262026-07-22T16:00:51Z2026-07-22T16:00:51ZAAS NovaAAS NovaHydrocarbons keep turning up in surprising places. This time, they've been found near a pair of accreting supermassive black holes 3 billion years after the Big Bang.Headline and summary from AAS Nova; follow the link for the full article.NASA’s James Webb catches a supermassive black hole feedingtag:deepfield.news,2026-07-18:story/cd3ac906be1ada142026-07-18T03:09:35Z2026-07-18T03:09:35ZScienceDailyScienceDailyJWST has captured unusually detailed images of gas feeding the supermassive black hole at the center of NGC 4696. A vast filament appears to funnel material into an 800-light-year-wide spinning disk, where gas races around at up to 600 kilometers per second. The findings suggest…Headline and summary from ScienceDaily; follow the link for the full article.Super-loud gravitational waves offer a new way to study black hole event horizonstag:deepfield.news,2026-07-16:story/98deae7d34aa16b92026-07-16T08:00:58Z2026-07-16T08:00:58ZPhysics WorldPhysics WorldRegion near the "surface of no return" was previously only accessible with theoretical modelsHeadline and summary from Physics World; follow the link for the full article.Hubble discovers first of star cluster’s missing black holestag:deepfield.news,2026-07-13:story/eea066e9da1c508a2026-07-13T14:00:00Z2026-07-13T14:00:00ZESA/HubbleESA/HubbleThe massive globular star cluster Omega Centauri has puzzled astronomers for decades. It should be filled with black holes left behind by exploding stars, yet evidence for them is scarce. Now, astronomers using archival data from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope and…Headline and summary from ESA/Hubble; follow the link for the full article.Stephen Hawking's black hole laws just got a major upgradetag:deepfield.news,2026-07-13:story/aad0232bcf476ed32026-07-13T10:41:43Z2026-07-13T10:41:43ZScienceDailyScienceDailyScientists have developed a new framework that could finally apply the laws of thermodynamics to real, ever-changing black holes instead of only perfectly stable ones. The advance may improve our understanding of black hole mergers, evaporation, and the powerful gravitational…Headline and summary from ScienceDaily; follow the link for the full article.Physicists recreate black hole energy extraction in the labtag:deepfield.news,2026-07-12:story/13b5e928b18e89922026-07-12T12:28:41Z2026-07-12T12:28:41ZScienceDailyScienceDailyResearchers have recreated the physics of extracting energy from a spinning black hole using a stationary device that produces synthetic ultrafast rotation. The achievement transforms a long-standing theoretical idea into a practical experiment and could inspire new advances in…Headline and summary from ScienceDaily; follow the link for the full article.Two More Thoughts on Little Red Dotstag:deepfield.news,2026-07-01:story/661ab0045659cafd2026-07-01T02:54:55Z2026-07-01T02:54:55ZAAS NovaAAS NovaWhat's behind the population of compact, reddish objects spotted by JWST? Two recent research articles have explored theories involving young globular clusters and little red dots with little blue companions.Headline and summary from AAS Nova; follow the link for the full article.A Wandering Supermassive Black Hole Eating a Startag:deepfield.news,2026-06-29:story/49235d3f24ab43c02026-06-29T16:00:54Z2026-06-29T16:00:54ZAAS NovaAAS NovaAstrobites reports on the first case of a supermassive black hole discovered away from its galaxy’s center, exposed when it tore apart a star in a tidal disruption event.Headline and summary from AAS Nova; follow the link for the full article.