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A long standing goal in astrophysics is to directly observe the immediate environment of a black hole with angular resolution comparable to the event horizon.  Such observations could lead to images of strong gravity effects that are expected near a black hole, and to the direct detection of dynamics near the black hole as matter orbits at near light speeds.  This capability would open a new window on the study of general relativity in the strong field regime, accretion and outflow processes at the edge of a black hole, the existence of event horizons, and fundamental...

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Testing General Relativity

 

Testing general relativity

The no-hair theorem of general relativity predicts that the spacetime around a black hole can be expressed in terms of only three parameters: the black hole mass, spin, and charge. Since it is hard to see how a real astrophysical black hole could sustain a large electric charge, the no-hair theorem predicts that the black hole can be characterized by its mass and spin alone.

The strong curvature of spacetime near a black hole produces a dark shadow surrounded by a bright photon ring. The shape of this shadow is roughly circular....

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The New York Times: "Black Hole Hunters"

June 8, 2015

"Aiming to make the first portrait of the hungry monster at the center of our galaxy, astronomers built 'a telescope as big as the world.'"

Black Hole Hunters by Dennis Overbye for The New York Times

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C. D. Brinkerink, C. Müller, H. Falcke, G. C. Bower, T. P. Krichbaum, E. Castillo, A. T. Deller, S. S. Doeleman, R. Fraga-Encinas, C. Goddi, A. Hernández-Gómez, D. H. Hughes, M. Kramer, J. Léon-Tavares, L. Loinard, A. Montaña, M. Mościbrodzka, G. N. Ortiz-León, D. Sanchez-Arguelles, R. P. J. Tilanus, G. W. Wilson, and J. A. Zensus. 2016. “Asymmetric structure in Sgr A* at 3 mm from closure phase measurements with VLBA, GBT and LMT.” MNRAS, 462, Pp. 1382-1392.
A. A. Chael, M. D. Johnson, R. Narayan, S. S. Doeleman, J. F. C. Wardle, and K. L. Bouman. 2016. “High-resolution Linear Polarimetric Imaging for the Event Horizon Telescope.” ApJ, 829, Pp. 11.
T. Johannsen, C. Wang, A. E. Broderick, S. S. Doeleman, V. L. Fish, A. Loeb, and D. Psaltis. 2016. “Testing General Relativity with Accretion-Flow Imaging of Sgr A*.” Physical Review Letters, 117, 9, Pp. 091101.

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