OMEGACat BH-2
First black hole discovered in Omega Centauri globular cluster.
Last updated
oMEGACat BH-2 is a binary system located in the central region of the Omega Centauri globular cluster, at a distance of 5,494 parsecs (17,919 light-years) in the constellation Centaurus. It consists of a stellar-mass black hole and a visible main-sequence companion star, and is notable as the first black hole discovered in the Omega Centauri globular cluster. The system holds the record for the longest orbital period known among black hole binaries.
Quick Facts
- Constellation
- Centaurus
- Black hole mass
- significantly lower than expected for a low-metallicity environment such as Omega Centauri
- Companion mass
- main-sequence star
- Orbital period
- longest-period black hole binary known to date
- Semi major axis
- 31 AU
Facts from the source article.
Background
The system was discovered as part of the international oMEGACat project, led by Nadine Neumayer and Anil Seth, which aimed to create a catalog of proper motions and spectra for 1.4 million stars in the cluster. A research team led by Matthew Whitaker from the University of Utah applied astrometry to measure the very small movements of stars over time, analyzing more than 20 years of archival data from the Hubble Space Telescope and incorporating recent data from the James Webb Space Telescope to refine the measurements. They discovered a main-sequence star moving in an elongated orbit around an invisible gravitational center. A previous study by another group of scientists had classified the hidden component as a neutron star, but the University of Utah team's refined mass estimate ruled out that possibility.
More in Binary and Multiple Stars
Sources
Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.
- Wikipedia: OMEGACat BH-2 (CC BY-SA 4.0).
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