Supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy gives up a secret
by ZDNet Author | February 14, 2012 9:00am PST | Image 1 of 10
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Sagittarius A*--or Sgr A*, as it's more commonly described--is a supermassive black hole at the center of our Milky Way. It's big and bad, containing about 4 million times the mass of our sun. It's also given to odd behavior; scientists say they can identify mysterious flares being emitted for a few hours each day.
After years seeking an explanation, astronomers using new data from the Chandra X-ray Observatory now think that they have found one: Sgr A* may simply be vaporizing and actually "devouring" asteroids that cross its path. Think of it as a galactic burp.
And there's no shortage of raw material for Sgr A* to consume. According to NASA, the cloud around Sgr A* contains literally trillions of asteroids and comets. Any celestial object passing with 100 million miles of the black hole--that's roughly the distance between Earth and the sun--would get obliterated. (We'd love to see how James T. Kirk could pull himself out of that one. Just saying.)
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Dave, this conversation can serve no purpose anymore. Goodbye.
It's called "Daisy."
... 'dicovering' that animals knew that rain was immanent becuase they could smell wet earth in the wind.
Doh. So can humans, if they get out of the lab and walk where there is something other than concrete for kilometres.
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