The James Webb Space Telescope reveals images of quasars that have undergone this phenomenon. “Gravitational lenses” so that they look like a ring studded with precious stones.
The European Space Agency (ESA) has released new images from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) showing the gravitational lensing effect of the quasar RX J1131-1231, located about 6 billion light-years from Earth in the constellation Crater.
As for gravitational lensing, it is a phenomenon that occurs when light traveling from a very distant luminous source is bent due to the gravitational pull of a massive object between the light source and the observer.
Quasars are energetic objects that may look like stars. But they are actually galaxies with an extremely bright center. But far from the world
The quasar RX J1131-1231 has experienced gravitational lensing. It is one of the clearest images of a gravitationally lensed quasar to date.
Gravitational lensing is what Albert Einstein predicted through his theory of relativity. It is an opportunity to study the region near black holes in quasars. Because as we mentioned above, gravitational lenses are caused by the bending of light due to gravity. And one of the things that have a huge mass is black holes.
According to Einstein's theory, spacetime in space is a web like a rubber sheet. When objects are in spacetime it is like dropping a steel ball. This causes a dent in the rubber sheet, creating a “curve”.
The more massive the object, the more pronounced the curves become. This causes the light that shines closer to it to follow this distorted space until it appears to deviate from its original path.
One of the benefits of gravitational lensing is that it can magnify distant astronomical objects. This allows astronomers to study objects that may be very faint or very far away.
Measurements of the quasar’s X-ray emissions could also indicate how fast the central black hole is spinning. This could provide important clues to researchers. How do black holes expand over time? For example, if black holes grow primarily as a result of collisions and mergers between galaxies? There should be a steady buildup of matter in the disk, and if new material is regularly added from the disk, this would lead to a rapidly rotating black hole. On the other hand, if the black hole expands by accumulating many small pieces of matter, it will collect matter from random directions.
The observation found that the black hole in this quasar is rotating at more than half the speed of light. This indicates that black holes grow by merging. Instead, objects are pulled in from different directions.
Compiled from European Space Agency
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