Using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, researchers observed for the first time a star gobbling up planets, Newsweek reports. Before Chandra, only computer simulators had predicted that a star could devour a planet. The star, known as RW Aur A, was shown soaking up debris from two infant planets that collided nearby in 2017. Scientists suggest the find brings them closer to understanding how exoplanets form.
Artist's rendering of the accretion disk in ULAS J1120+0641, a very distant quasar powered by a black hole with a mass two billion times that of the Sun.[1]
A quasar (/ˈkweɪzɑːr/) (also known as a QSO or quasi-stellar object) is an extremely luminous active galactic nucleus (AGN). It has been theorized that most large galaxies contain a supermassive central black hole with mass ranging from millions to billions of times the mass of our Sun. In quasars and other types of AGN, the black hole is surrounded by a gaseous accretion disk. As gas falls toward the black hole, energy is released in the form of electromagnetic radiation, which can be observed across the electromagnetic spectrum. The power radiated by quasars is enormous: the most powerful quasars have luminosities thousands of times greater than a galaxy such as the Milky Way.[2]
Artist's rendering of the accretion disk in ULAS J1120+0641, a very distant quasar powered by a black hole with a mass two billion times that of the Sun.[1]
A quasar (/ˈkweɪzɑːr/) (also known as a QSO or quasi-stellar object) is an extremely luminous active galactic nucleus (AGN). It has been theorized that most large galaxies contain a supermassive central black hole with mass ranging from millions to billions of times the mass of our Sun. In quasars and other types of AGN, the black hole is surrounded by a gaseous accretion disk. As gas falls toward the black hole, energy is released in the form of electromagnetic radiation, which can be observed across the electromagnetic spectrum. The power radiated by quasars is enormous: the most powerful quasars have luminosities thousands of times greater than a galaxy such as the Milky Way.[2]