BIGBANG -’SOBER’

Last Hope - Paramore

Astronomers Capture First Image of a Black Hole

The Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) — a planet-scale array of eight ground-based radio telescopes forged through international collaboration — was designed to capture images of a black hole. Today, in coordinated press conferences across the globe, EHT researchers revealed that they have succeeded, unveiling the first direct visual evidence of a supermassive black hole and its shadow. The image reveals the black hole at the centre of Messier 87, a massive galaxy in the nearby Virgo galaxy cluster. This black hole resides 55 million light-years from Earth and has a mass 6.5 billion times that of the Sun. Supermassive black holes are relatively tiny astronomical objects — which has made them impossible to directly observe until now. As the size of a black hole’s event horizon is proportional to its mass, the more massive a black hole, the larger the shadow. Thanks to its enormous mass and relative proximity, M87’s black hole was predicted to be one of the largest viewable from Earth — making it a perfect target for the EHT.  The shadow of a black hole is the closest we can come to an image of the black hole itself, a completely dark object from which light cannot escape. The black hole’s boundary — the event horizon from which the EHT takes its name — is around 2.5 times smaller than the shadow it casts and measures just under 40 billion km across.

Credit: ESO

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M60-UCD1 black hole, via NASA

I think one of my favorite stories I’ve ever heard Mark Hamill tell is the one about how the first time he heard the score for A New Hope he got sort of jokingly offended because it seemed like every other character had a specific song for them and he didn’t and John Williams just looked at him and said “…The main theme is your song” and Mark was like “WHAT OMG” like he didn’t actually understand before that moment that he was the protagonist.

for crx!!! these kids go thru a lot but they’re so strong when together;;

I'm a girl and I love science 😀

Science Side of Tumblr, I need your help!  Ladies of the Science Side of Tumblr, I especially need your help!

I had a conversation at my non-science day job that went like this:

A friend who shall be called Diane (not her real name) comes to my desk to chat.  Just one of the many topics we discuss is that her boyfriend is  taking a class in wildlife biology.  She has decided that she has grown tired of hearing about local wildlife and hearing him recite a plethora of scientific names. 

I responded positively to this subject, and told her that I too found the subject interesting.  A third person had heard our conversation.  We shall call her Claire (again, not her real name).  Claire immediately responded, “Girls don’t like that kind of thing.”

“Are you saying that girls don’t like science?” I asked.

“No, not normally they don’t,” she responded.

Before you all screech with anguish, bear with me for a moment.  We all know that this is not true.  As a man, I find this idea upsetting for countless reasons that have all been validly discussed before.  To try to debate the issue is rather moot.  Instead, I’d like a show of hands.

Ladies of the Science Side of Tumblr!  I call you to arms!  Will you rally around me in saying that women can and do indeed love science, of any variety?  Gentleman of the Science Side of Tumblr who know someone who is a girl who also happens to love science, will you stand with me too?  We all like and reblog the pro-women-in-science posts we see so often, let’s all stand and be counted in one place this time.

Reblog this if you are a woman who loves science.  Reblog this if you are a man who knows a woman who loves science.  Let us disprove her beyond all doubt!

Handsome Kings ♥

this needs to be on everyone’s blog.

his tiny chair! 🥺