Black Holes

Black holes are regions of space where gravity is so strong that nothing — not even light — can escape once it crosses the event horizon. They form when massive stars collapse at the end of their lives, or through other extreme processes. Predicted by Einstein's general relativity, black holes were long considered theoretical curiosities. But in 2019, the Event Horizon Telescope captured the first direct image of a black hole — the supermassive black hole at the center of galaxy M87, 6.5 billion times the mass of our Sun. At the center of our own Milky Way galaxy sits Sagittarius A*, a supermassive black hole 4 million times the mass of the Sun. These cosmic giants play crucial roles in galaxy formation and evolution. Black holes represent a place where our current understanding of physics fails — quantum mechanics and general relativity contradict each other at the singularity, making them one of science's greatest mysteries.