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    Black Hole May Eat Asteroids

    Click here to listen to this podcast

    At the center of our Milky Way galaxy is a supermassive black hole. It weighs as much as four million suns. The black hole is hefty, but it's pretty tranquil most of the time.

    It does act up on occasion, though. Astrophysicists estimate that the black hole devours a star every 100,000 years or so, producing a major flare as the star is shredded and then ingested.

    And smaller flares are observed more or less daily. For a few hours the galaxy's central black hole becomes brighter at x-ray wavelengths by a factor of a few up to 100.

    What could produce these frequent flares? A trio of astrophysicists in Europe has an idea. They propose that the black hole could be steadily feeding on a cloud of asteroids in the Milky Way's center. Those asteroids would have been stripped from orbits around nearby stars. The report will appear in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. [Kastytis Zubovas et al., "Sgr A* flares: tidal disruption of asteroids and planets?"]

    The researchers estimate that the destruction of an asteroid 10 or 20 kilometers across would produce an observable flare. That's quite an impressive feat. But for a supermassive black hole, it's all in a day's work.

    —John Matson

    [The above text is a transcript of this podcast.]

    Follow Scientific American on Twitter @SciAm and @SciamBlogs. Visit ScientificAmerican.com for the latest in science, health and technology news.
    © 2012 ScientificAmerican.com. All rights reserved.

     

    22 comments

    • Tired278  •  3 mths ago
      Asteroids stay crunchy, even in Milky Ways!
    • Joe M  •  3 mths ago
      send a camera in there already so we can see what is inside.
    • carlo  •  3 mths ago
      If black holes gobble up suns without a problem, why would an asteroid be a big feat?
      I would think it would be like a grain of sand!
    • A nony mouse  •  3 mths ago
      So what you are saying is that black holes are the butt pirates of the universe...eating asteroids...cool.
    • Andy D  •  Whitinsville, Massachusetts  •  3 mths ago
      It's an intergalatic Pacman!
    • David H  •  3 mths ago
      Well this is a no-brainer. If a black hole can rip apart and devour stars and planets of course its gonna swallow asteroids as well.
    • soledadg  •  Middletown, New York  •  3 mths ago
      well duh, not even light can escape a massive black hole. #$%$ yahoo
    • resvorhog  •  Boca Raton, Florida  •  3 mths ago
      anybody else got a boner?
      • Marcus 3 mths ago
        I've got an extra boner if anyone needs it?
    • Justin Kase  •  3 mths ago
      This is definitely one story where I skipped right to the comments.
    • ThaBullDawg  •  Hurricane, Utah  •  3 mths ago
      What do they mean "may"??
      Black-holes basically suck everything in their path (inducing stars).
      Asteroids would be like an appetizer to a black-hole.
      • timothyr 3 mths ago
        like eating a one inch chameleon compared to a bus.
    • Chuck  •  3 mths ago
      Rock-Paper-Scissors-Lizard Spock...
    • Bareasskmeagain  •  3 mths ago
      Black holes eat hemorrhoids
    • EnuffWithTheKlown  •  Fair Oaks, California  •  3 mths ago
      Hey Stop-It..!..
      ...This is serious Black Hole stuffaHahahahe Ohh-my a black-ho,he said hohahaha ohhoa ho intheskyhaha..this is serious reportings-hahahaw-stop-it this is serreeousah ho that weill eatuswhole..hahahehehahaha
    • Nyuk  •  3 mths ago
      Reminds me of a joke about Klingons...
    • TAB  •  3 mths ago
      they misspelled "assteroids."
    • Lawrence  •  Englewood, Colorado  •  3 mths ago
      My socks develope black holes sometimes... Then they just collapse in upon themeselves and disappear!
    • Liz  •  3 mths ago
      Misleading title is stupid. Of course Black holes eat asteroids they eat everything. Then read the story, its about occasional flares in the black hole in our galaxy that they believe is related to an asteroid field its been feeding on. BIG DIFFERENCE.
    • Harold  •  St Louis, Missouri  •  3 mths ago
      monkey descendants,college educated and there science gods of useless. another public funded crap.
    • AwakeAlertOrientedx3  •  3 mths ago
      The American debt should be renamed the Obama Hole. It is eating everything, too.
    • tim  •  3 mths ago
      whats all this i keep hearing about black ho's? .......oh holes ....nevermind
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