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Scientists Discover Teeny Tiny Black Hole

Posted by Zonk on from the for-relative-terms-of-teeny-and-tiny dept.

AbsoluteXyro writes "According to a Space.com article, NASA scientists have discovered the smallest known black hole to date. The object is known as 'XTE J1650-500'. Weighing in at a scant 3.8 solar masses and measuring only 15 miles across, this finding sheds new light on the lower limit of black hole sizes and the critical threshold at which a star will become a black hole upon its death, rather than a neutron star. XTE J1650-500 beats out the previous record holder, GRO 1655-40, by about 2.5 solar masses."

13 of 277 comments (clear)

  1. That's nothing... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    They say LHC-001 will be even smaller!

    (But who will be there to measure...?)

    1. Re:That's nothing... by Enoxice · · Score: 5, Informative

      LHC = Large Hadron Collider: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_Hadron_Collider

      001 = First black hole created by LHC

      Some people are afraid the LHC-001 is going to destroy the Earth.

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    2. Re:That's nothing... by sayfawa · · Score: 5, Funny

      There may already be microscopic (more like picoscopic) black holes all around us. The thing with black holes is they are only dangerous if you get close to them. If they are small they can whiz right through us without hitting anything, much like many other particles that pass through us all the time. I'm not saying that creating one would be a good idea, but if, on the off-chance, one were created by the LHC it will probably be innocuous. I wish I could make those sound less like famous last words.

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    3. Re:That's nothing... by inode_buddha · · Score: 5, Funny

      Nope. Umatched socks are simply the larval stage of coat hangers.

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  2. Black-hole... sheds new light... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    HILARITY!

  3. Awwww, little baby one by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    It may look cute now. But they grow up.

  4. Size vs Age by __aapbzv4610 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    While it may be possible that this black hole was formed from a relatively small (to form a black hole) star, couldn't it also be the case that it just a really old black hole? Hawkings told of how black holes can 'evaporate' over time with lack of surrounding matter, perhaps that could be the case here.

    1. Re:Size vs Age by smolloy · · Score: 5, Informative
      It is true that black holes will evaporate over time, but they will also gain mass from infalling matter.

      But!

      The temperature of a black hole can be defined by the rate at which Hawking photons are streaming away from it. In the case of a black hole of a few solar masses, this temperature will be in the nano-Kelvin (I think -- don't hurt me if I'm wrong by a few orders of magnitude). Now remember everything in the Universe is sitting in a bath of cold photons from the Big Bang (i.e. the microwave background). These photons have a temperature of ~4 Kelvin.

      Therefore, black holes whose Hawking temperature is above the microwave background will be net *gaining* mass.

      Which is all a long way of saying, no, this isn't a normal size black hole that has decayed over time. It must have been created at this mass (or smaller).

  5. Goldilocks by Dopamine,+Redacted · · Score: 5, Funny

    So, we've now discovered the biggest and smallest black holes known to exist within about a week of each other.

    When we find the most average, space bears will come and blast us into porridge.

    Astronomy kicks ass.

  6. untrue statement by ILuvRamen · · Score: 5, Interesting

    They can't figure out the "critical threshold" because there isn't one. It all depends on too many variables to set a universal limit (hehehe get it...universal :-P) It depends on how much nuclear activity there is still going on when it start collapsing and what the amount of heavier atoms is and the amount of other things orbiting the star and any other forces affecting the star at that time and how fast it's moving and spinning. Mass is a smaller part of the calculation than they're making it sound like. If they're going to factor everything in just to find some minimum mass, well duh, two particles and a hell of a lot of force. Haven't they suggested that in that big particle accelerator aka donut of doom. So yeah, a critical mass threshold doesn't exist.

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  7. Re:Probably Something Stupid by Geoffrey.landis · · Score: 5, Informative

    I thought that Black Holes had no dimensions, but this one is several miles across. Where have I gone wrong?

    A black hole, conventionally, consists of an event horizon surrounding a region of space from which you can't send information to the external world. This region of space is not a point, it has a well-defined circumference. (Because of the non-euclidean nature of general relativity, it doesn't actually have a well-defined radius (since you can't measure across the middle!) but people usually just consider the radius as if it were defined as the circumference divided by 2 pi, and don't worry about the fact that you can't actually measure it.)

    At the center of the black hole is, according to general relativity, a point singularity, which indeed has no dimensions.

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  8. Oh shit... by neokushan · · Score: 5, Funny

    If that happens, what are we going to do!? Capitan Picard hasn't been born yet! Hell, even Kirk isn't around yet....

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  9. What the article fails to pont out is ... by celtic_hackr · · Score: 5, Funny

    This newly discovered Black Hole is the final result of a Large Hadron Collider, that caused a microsopic black hole on the third planet formerly circling the former star now known as 'XTE J1650-500'. So, this is not a naturally occuring black hole, but an alien-created one. Sadly this alien species is now extinct so they can't tell us how to avoid their mistake.