Scientists Measure Power And Speed Of A Black Hole And It's Intense

A groundbreaking study has finally quantified the kinetic energy of a black hole’s relativistic jets, and TL:DR, they're far more powerful than previously theorized. By observing the Cygnus X-1 binary system in our galaxy, a team from University of Oxford have found that the jet power of a black hole within it is equivalent to 10,000 Suns.

The research, published in the Nature journal, focuses on a stellar-mass black hole located within Cygnus X-1, some 7,200 light years away. As with black holes as we know them, when matter spirals inward, not all of it is swallowed; a significant portion is blasted outward in two opposing jets. Using a combination of X-ray data and radio observations, the team, led by Steve Prabu, determined that these jets are moving at half the speed of light, or roughly 355 million mph. More significantly, they calculated the kinetic ...