This donut-shaped ring of gas that used to be a star can tell astronomers about the supermassive black hole that molded it.
Astronomers directed the Hubble Space Telescope to observe the TDE, but it struggled to watch the event unfold from such a great distance and couldn’t capture any images. A team of astronomers didn’t give up, though. They examined the UV light from the destroyed star and teased out the details of the event. They presented their findings at the 241st Meeting of the American Astronomical Society.
This TDE was close enough and bright enough to allow detailed UV spectrometry of the event, unusual for events that are typically difficult to observe. Astronomers were able to gather spectrometric data for a longer than normal period of time. The spectrometry revealed the presence of hydrogen, carbon, and more in the gas from the former star.
“We’re looking somewhere on the edge of that donut. We’re seeing a stellar wind from the black hole sweeping over the surface that’s being projected towards us at speeds of 20 million miles per hour ,” says Maksym. “We really are still getting our heads around the event. You shred the star and then it’s got this material that’s making its way into the black hole. And so you’ve got models where you think you know what is going on, and then you’ve got what you actually see.
That’s all true, but SMBHs do more than just consume matter. They also flare brightly in X-ray, UV, and optical light, and can sometimes emit energetic jets back out into their galaxy as part of a poorly-understood process called. This is part of how SMBHs and galaxies are inextricably linked. Somehow, their growth and evolution is tied together, but there are many unanswered questions.
TDEs were mostly theoretical until the last few years. Now they’re the subject of intense observations. TDEs allow astrophysicists to watch as the SMBHs produce winds and turn jets on and off as they consume a star. And in the near future we should find more of them.
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