Black holes have always been a mystery to astronomers. They cannot be seen and even though scientists have some idea on how they were formed, it is not yet certain how exactly how they are formed. This is most true for supermassive black holes that are in the center of many galaxies. Astronomers think that molecular gas disks might have something to do with it.
Researchers from the University of Tokyo along with other collaborators used the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) telescope and other telescopes to look at dense molecular gasses at the center of large galaxies. These dense molecular gasses supply gasses to the supermassive black holes there, according to Phys Org.
The team is led by Tekuma Izumi, a graduate student and JPS fellow at the Graduate School of Science at the University of Tokyo. By using the ALMA telescope in Chile, as well as other telescopes, Izumi and his team have observed dense molecular gas disks as large as a few light years in diameter, as reported by Science Daily. Through their observations, they have found that these gasses have been supplying the black holes, which makes them more massive in time.
The team has also observed that the changes in gas levels in the disks are due to an increasing amount of gasses falling into these supermassive black holes. This is further enhanced by supernovas exploding when a star collapses within the dense gas disks. The stars explode due to gases being taken from them, which accelerates the star's collapse, thus causing a supernova.
Izumi has said that their research is a big step in revealing one aspect on how supermassive black holes are formed. He said that their research will continue as they look towards the outer regions of the universe through the use of ALMA. He has observed that there is much research that needs to be done in order to understand supermassive black holes and how they operate.
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