Fastest Spinning Black Hole Ever Found

brian0918 writes, "NewScientist reports that researchers in Cambridge have detected a black hole spinning at nearly 1,000 times per second — the fastest ever recorded. From the article: 'McClintock's team examined a black hole in our galaxy called GRS 1915+105, which lies about 36,000 light years away. They found the innermost stable orbit around GRS 1915 is so close that the black hole must be spinning at nearly 1000 times per second. The finding supports the idea that only fast-spinning stars can collapse to create powerful explosions called long gamma-ray bursts.'" The Astrophysical Journal abstract is open but you have to be a subscriber to read the full article there.

Comments

Fastest Spinning Black-Hole

[Quaoar]

I thought this title was held by White House press secretary Tony Snow...

Re:Fastest Spinning Black-Hole

[brian0918]

Ahh, so he's considered a black hole because of his ability to absorb vast amounts of information, yet emit nothing in return, except through accidental leaks over billions of years? Brilliant insight!

Get the full text (no subscription) here

[Anonymous Coward]

The astrophysics arXiv preprint from June.

The moon is green cheese

[EmbeddedJanitor]

Yes, a deliberately inflammatory subject line. In The Olde Dayes, people said the moon was made of green cheese because it has the colour of green (unripened) cheese and their models were not very sophisticated. We still rely on models and the outcomes are only as good as the models themselves, and the observations they are based on.

People, what we have is a model, not an observation. As TFA says, this model is based on assumptions, though fewer assumptions in the past:"Now, astronomers have measured the spin of a black hole with a new method that requires fewer assumptions."

The black hole may indeed be spinning at 1000 revs, or is might just be that one of the model assumptions is invalid.

Re:Orbiting at no more than 30 miles from the cent

[Eternauta3k]

It's got to be on the verge of exploding. I wonder what effect the explosion will have here on Earth at 38,000 light years away?

Maybe it has already exploded. Just wait 38,000 years to find out.

Re:why spinning it good

[qwijibo]

A 747 could easily be deflected with BBs. The velocity and quantity of BBs is the most relevant factor. A billion BBs would deflect a 747 pretty easily. Or maybe just a handful of BBs at 2/3 the speed of light.

Re:Multi-Dimensional Universe

[Jerf]

Uh, "Informative" my ass. A selection of other "technology" articles from India Daily, obtained simply by clicking on the "technology" tab on their page:

Gravity wave connectors through black hole singularities connect integrated consciousness from the chilled universe: Mathematically it is clear now that gravity waves can easily pass through the points of singularities in the black holes. These connect the integrated consciousness and provide guidance from the chilled universe below the Hyperspace.

We are part of a super advanced Type IV extraterrestrial civilization- projection of Zero Point Energy Module encapsulated as life on 3-D vector space with increasing span: After attaining perfection or 'Error Vector zero', we move on to higher dimension and continue the process till we cross into the chilled universe.

The world of advanced extraterrestrial civilizations - life-surrounding singularities: The time and space dimensions (infinite in numbers) can be accessed individually, manipulated and new configurations can be created.

India Times articles often show on Fark; I'll leave it to you to guess why.

Moderators: Big words != informative.