First evidence of a rotating black hole

**First Evidence of a Spinning Black Hole**

On September 27, 2023, astronomers recorded the first direct evidence of a rotating black hole¹. These observations focused on the supergiant black hole at the center of the Milky Way sub-Messie 87, whose ghost was captured by the Event Horizon Telescope.

M87 is a black hole situated 55 million light years away from Earth. It has a size of 6.5 billion times larger than the Sun. There is a disk located just behind the black hole that attracts gas and dust, rotating around the hole in outer space. It is anticipated that some of this material will fall into the black hole, being lost forever. However, a portion of it is projected to be expelled from the black hole's poles at a speed exceeding 99.99% of the speed of light.

Theoretical models suggest that the rotation of the black hole is the cause of this phenomenon. Scientists think that charged particles in the disk create a strong magnetic field and that as the black hole spins, it pulls the magnetic field with it. This curls the magnetic field in a way that can accelerate particles out of the black hole in the form of jets, extracting energy from the black hole's rotation in the process.

The latest work, published in Nature, used observations of M87 from a global network of radio telescopes conducted from 2000-2022. This revealed an 11-year cycle in the jet, which was found to progress around a central point at the edge of the black hole. This indicates a discrepancy between the black hole's rotation axis and the receiving disk, causing the jet to vibrate like a spinning top.

"The discovery of this evolution provides irrefutable evidence that the supermassive black hole in M87 is indeed rotating, thereby increasing our understanding of the nature of supermassive black holes," the authors say.

The new discovery promises to decode the mystery behind the formation of supermassive black holes.