A MYSTERIOUS signal is pulsing at the center of our galaxy, scientists have revealed.
The galactic throb at the heart of the Milky Way was detected in telescope data from between June and December 2022.
This particular recurring pulse was spied near Sagitarrius A* – or Sgr A*, for short – by the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope.
Sgr A* is the supermassive black hole that lives around 26,000 lightyears away from Earth, consuming matter at the center of our galaxy.
And a mysterious object, described only as a “blob” in a study from the University of Mexico, was found to be the source of a pulsing electromagnetic signal.
It’s a gamma-ray “fluctuation” that takes place every 76.32 minutes, according to scientists in the paper published on arXiv.
Black holes don’t emit detectable radiation like this, so Sgr A* is ruled out as the source.
Instead, scientists believe that the recurring beat of the signal is evidence that the source object is orbiting the black hole.
Plenty of light – some invisible to the human eye – is emitted from near Sgr A*.
And scientists were able to detect a pattern of flaring gamma radiation, which can only be seen via special telescopes.
A similar signal has been detected from the same region every 149 minutes – but that’s an X-ray flare as opposed to a gamma radiation.
Scientists don’t know exactly what it is that is orbiting the black hole and emitting these signals.
The best guess is “a blob of magnetised matter”, which was previously suggested in a 2022 study.
And they think there there is a “single physical mechanism” that produces the signals they’re detecting.
The blob is estimated to take around 70 to 80 minutes to orbit the black hole at a distance similar to the gap between Mercury and the Sun, according to Science Alert.
And it’s believed to be travelling at speeds equivalent to 30% of the speed of light.
The speed of light is around 670 million mph, so this object may be travelling as fast as 223 million mph.
As the blob makes its way around the black hole, it emits lets out bright flares of radiation.
Sadly scientists can’t yet be sure exactly what is happening near Sgr A* due to the difficulty in observing the black holes and their surroundings.
What is a black hole?
A black hole is an area of space where gravity is immensely strong – the point that nothing can escape it.
It’s called a black hole because even light lacks the energy to get out of a black hole.
Contrary to popular belief, black holes don’t actually “suck up” matter – but instead have strong enough gravity that objects simply fall into them.
Once an object passes the event horizon – the point at which escape is impossible – it will be torn apart.
It’s not even possible to see something cross the event horizon because time itself slows down and stops at the boundary.
There are generally two types of black holes.
There are smaller stellar-mass black holes, which Nasa says have between “three to dozens of times the Sun’s mass”.
And there are supermassive black holes that weigh “100,000 to billions of solar masses”, which are typically found in the centers of large galaxies – including the Milky Way.
Stellar-mass black holes can form when very large stars collapse under their own weight after running out of fuel.
We know less about how supermassive black holes form, but they are generally thought to be extremely old – dating back to the beginning of galaxies.
Dr. Thomas Hughes is a UK-based scientist and science communicator who makes complex topics accessible to readers. His articles explore breakthroughs in various scientific disciplines, from space exploration to cutting-edge research.
