Astronomers in Chile have discovered a star dancing around a black hole in the Milky Way, just as Albert Einstein might have predicted more than a century ago.
Gloria Tso has more.
Using one of the world's largest telescopes, astronomers in Chile have found a star dancing at the heart of our Milky Way galaxy.
And the course of that orbit helps to proves Albert Einstein right, more than a century later.
The European Southern Observatory, or ESO, announced the find on Thursday (April 16).
They think the star may be orbiting a supermassive black hole, called Sagittarius A* (Sagittarius A-Star) hypothesized to be the well in time and space that sits in the middle of the galaxy.
According to Einstein's theory of relativity in 1915, the 'dancing' star orbiting the black hole - would perform a twirl as gets close.
That's what Thursday's announcement points to - and it's just the latest discovery that backs up Einstein.
And as Alejandra Jimenez from the Max Planck Institute explains, it also gives evidence that the immense Sagittarius A* exists.
(SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) OFFICIAL AT THE MAX PLANCK INSTITUTE FOR EXTRATERRESTRIAL PHYSICS, ALEJANDRA JIMENEZ, SAYING: "There is a lot of evidence that massive black holes exist, but to say that they exist we had to demonstrate two things: that this said object is massive but at the same time compact, and that the General Theory of Relativity formulated by (Albert) Einstein correctly describes what happens naturally." ESO scientists said nearly 30 years of measurements allowed them to follow the star's rosette-shaped orbit around Sagittarius A*.
That's a point for Einstein, and not his predecessor Isaac Newton, who believed the star would travel in an ellipse-like pattern.
Having already found evidence for relativity, scientists' next step is to look at stars closer to Sagittarius A* to see how being so close to it warps their path through the cosmos.
Berlin, Germany (SPX) Apr 16, 2024
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