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Sunday, May 3, 2015

Black holes

A black hole is a dense, compact object whose gravitational pull is so strong that - within a certain distance of it - nothing can escape, not even light.

If a star has three times or more the core mass of the Sun and collapses, it can form a black hole. These bizarre objects are found across the Universe – within double star systems and at the centers of galaxies where giant black holes grow. X-ray telescopes like Chandra can see superheated matter that is swirling toward the event horizon of a black hole.