Scientists talked about the formation of planets around supermassive black holes
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- Scientists talked about the formation of planets around supermassive black holes
Astronomers have found out that supermassive black holes in the centers of active galaxies can serve as the largest "nurseries" of planets in the universe. A computer model has shown that the dust disks around these objects are suitable for the formation of millions of new worlds. This was reported in the magazine on May 31. Phys.org .
Active galactic nuclei are regions in the centers of galaxies where a supermassive black hole is actively absorbing surrounding gas and dust. The jets they launch can span hundreds of thousands of light-years.
According to conventional wisdom, planets are born in disks of gas and dust around young stars. However, similar disks — of incomparably larger scale — surround supermassive black holes in the centers of active galactic nuclei. As a group of scientists has established, the outer edges of these disks — the so—called tori - resemble planet-forming disks around ordinary stars in temperature and chemical composition, which allows dust to stick together and gradually form planetary bodies.
The researchers uploaded data on the temperatures and gas composition of the outer ring into a computer model of the magnetized disk of the black hole and calculated the key parameters.: the rate at which dust particles clump together, the final size of planets, and the amount of matter they can absorb over millions of years. According to the simulation results, planets form much faster in such conditions than around ordinary stars and can grow larger than Jupiter.
"Our approximate model suggests that the dusty tori of active galactic nuclei are the largest clusters of planets in the universe," the study says.
Some objects are capable of accumulating so much matter that they will turn into stars. The authors also predict the appearance of exotic massive bodies consisting mainly of dust — nothing like this has yet been discovered in known planetary systems. The researchers acknowledge that the hypothesis is theoretical in nature and requires observational confirmation.
On May 27, Universe Today magazine reported the discovery of a supermassive black hole, QSO1, formed before the stars of its own galaxy. The full name of the space object is Abell2744-QSO1. According to astronomers, the black hole weighs 50 million solar masses.
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