LMR-065 · Galaxies
Quasar
A baby black hole eating so fast it outshines its entire galaxy.
§ A first look
§ Depths
Six ways into the same idea — from bedtime story to chalkboard. No order required.
L1 · Crayon
Told like a bedtime story.
For a curious 10-year-old. No jargon. Just a picture in your head.
Almost every big galaxy has a giant black hole at its centre. Usually that central black hole is fairly quiet — just sitting there, not eating much, behaving itself. But sometimes a lot of gas falls toward it at once. The gas doesn't fall straight in — it whirls round and round, getting hotter and brighter as it spirals closer. The whole glowing mess can outshine all the hundreds of billions of stars in its galaxy combined. A galaxy in that state is called a quasar. Most of the quasars we see today shone before Earth even existed, so we're effectively watching ancient meals.
§ Strange but true
- 01The brightest objects in the universe — single black holes outshining their entire galaxy.
- 02Their light has been traveling for billions of years. By the time it arrives, they've often gone quiet.
- 03Some quasars eat the equivalent of a Sun every day.
§ From the field journal
Quasar
"A baby black hole eating so fast it outshines its entire galaxy."
— observed, sketched, not yet fully understood.
§ Nearby
Constellations near Quasar
→
Black Hole
A place in the sky where the door only opens one way.
→
Galaxy
A herd of a hundred billion stars, held together by gravity and dark matter.
→
Accretion Disk
The brightest things in the universe are made of stuff falling.
→
Redshift
The universe is stretching, and dragging every wavelength of light with it.