From Newsgroup: sci.space.news


https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=6762

NuSTAR Spots Temperature Swings of Black Hole Winds
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
March 1, 2017

For the first time, scientists have measured rapidly varying temperatures
in hot gas emanating from around a black hole. These ultrafast "winds"
are created by disks of matter surrounding black holes.

The winds, according to new measurements of a nearby supermassive black
hole obtained with NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) telescope, can heat up and cool down in the span of just a few hours.
The black hole is located in the active galaxy IRAS 13224-3809 in the constellation Centaurus. Scientists report these findings, using data
from NuSTAR and European Space Agency's XMM-Newton telescope, in the journal Nature.

"We know that supermassive black holes affect the environment of their
host galaxies, and powerful winds arising from near the black hole may
be one means for them to do so," says NuSTAR Principal Investigator Fiona Harrison, professor at Caltech in Pasadena. "The rapid variability, observed for the first time, is providing clues as to how these winds form and
how much energy they may carry out into the galaxy."

Full story from Caltech http://www.caltech.edu/news/temperature-swings-black-hole-winds-measured-first-time-54263

News Media Contact
Elizabeth Landau
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-6425
elizabeth.landau@jpl.nasa.gov

Whitney Clavin
Caltech, Pasadena, Calif.
626-395-1856
wclavin@caltech.edu

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