A Black Hole Warps The Fabric Of Space-Time

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Hubble's Universe Unfiltered (Episode 5): Through a Lens, Brightly. Gravitational Lensing - A Black Hole Warps The Fabric Of Space-Time.

Einstein's theory of general relativity says that the presence of matter warps the space around it. The more matter there is, the stronger the warp. For really strong distortions of space-time, like black holes, the warping acts like a lens and markedly changes the path of light that passes through it.

Such gravitational lenses have been found, and astronomers can use them to study very distant and very faint galaxies. Join us and see how the combination of a huge galaxy cluster and the observations from two space telescopes enable study of a galaxy whose light would otherwise be unobservable.

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Notes

► The title of this video podcast, "Through a lens, brightly" plays off the familiar phrase "through a lens, darkly," which is a slightly shifted version of the phrase "through a glass, darkly." Wikipedia reports that the phrase originally comes from the New Testament and is taken to mean that we have an imperfect view of our world and ourselves. The "glass" in the original version of the phrase is said to be a mirror (i.e., a looking glass), and not a glass lens. Hence, the shifted version that I have used, in order to evoke the idea of a gravitational lens, is a misinterpretation of the original. However, since Hubble uses many mirrors and lenses in observing the universe, one could come up with some weasel excuse as to why it is appropriate. One could, but not me. It just sounded cool.

► The scientific visualization of a black hole passing through Baltimore's Inner Harbor was done with software graciously provided to me by Brian McLeod of Harvard University. The software accurately calculates the deviation of light as it bends around a point-mass black hole. Folks often ask the size of the black hole, but I don't truly know. The software allows me to specify the size of the ring in pixels, without reference to the mass of a black hole needed to produce that large of a ring. For Brian's lensed castle image, he states the mass required as being about the mass of Saturn. For the Baltimore image, the effect is bigger and the mass should be a bit larger. Perhaps Jupiter's mass would be a decent estimate.

► Almost all of the gravitationally lensed arcs seen in the galaxy cluster Abell 1689 are short segments of circles centered on the mass of the cluster. We call them "tangential arcs," and they are the dominant type of lensed arcs seen. However, Abell 1689 is massive enough that "radial arcs," which extend out along lines from the center, can be seen as well. One radial arc can be seen at about the eight o'clock position, below and to the left of the central galaxy. In most galaxy clusters, these radial arcs are too faint or too small or too close to the central galaxy to be seen.

► Gravitational lensing can produce multiple lensed images of the same object in the sky. Light from the object can reach us by taking multiple routes through the distorted space-time of the gravitational lens. Since these routes are of different lengths, light takes different amounts of time to travel along them. Hence, each lensed image shows the object at a slightly different time. In some lenses, we can see a change happen in one lensed image that doesn't show up until days, months, or even years later in another lensed image of that same object.

• http://hubblesite.org/explore_astronomy/hubbles_universe_unfiltered/5
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Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• black
• holes
• warps
• fabric
• space-time
• gravitational
• lensing
• nasa
• esa
• hubble
• spitzer
• space
• telescopes
• lenses
• einstein
• theories
• general
• relativity
• matter
• energy
• warping
• time
• astronomers
• galaxies
• clusters
• science
• universe
• abell
• 1689
• images

[SignMePlease1]

This guy seems like the biggest douche in the world.

[BigBang4Life1]

i understood like 50% of what you said.. this stuff is too mind-blowing and complicated for me to understand

[JohnChenGoogling]

He talks like my drinking partner!

[TheBaldchipmunk]

If time is faster in space than on Earth we could send a telescope out in space and have it take a picture and send it back the speed of light, while we look at it we may get the picture back a nanosecond before it appears to take a picture. This could be how to get information from the future to the present.

[xINVISIGOTHx]

woudn't the strong gravitational force pull the water and boats into the hole? and maybe some buildings and ground

[jonathanelfinlied]

i am sparta.....

[ragazoor]

@vaj99 that isn't science, that's madness! and it's most certanly not Sparta either

[FIGHTFANNERD3]

@vaj99 wtf are you talking u moron

[FIGHTFANNERD3]

@system0system0 u idiot

[buuum98]

It's really amazing how all the matter that can exist. What if in another form, and perhaps in a parallel universe where there can be up to infinite numbers of them, matter are not existing, maybe things are temporary, maybe the flow of time is considered long but yet short when we feel it? Conspiracies and theories of what we live in, and yet perhaps we are just another frequency, all these are not easily understood. Try viewing other videos to understand better!

[buuum98]

Currently, our sol system is able to sustain a considerable amount of Universal gravitational force is due to the fact that there is matter pulling it intact. Let's assume that what we see in the night sky is a huge lens, then what can we expect to observe through the lens? It's the outlines, or I would say edges of the black hole. Yes, there be no color, we might not be able to see anything but consider the fact we are able to gaze at stars and even see the blackness, what are we not able to s

[buuum98]

Well, for one thing, he left the fact that in the universe we exist in, the mass of emptiness in between an event horizon and our sun or earth, for that matter, there is actually dark energy and the proposed dark matter or dark energy already encompasses most of the space our universe might contain. This black hole would have than been amounted to the darkness, as it bounds by the mass of matter contained in this universe. If this was accurately added into the explanation, it might have been mu

[tricd0444]

... This dude needs to get a video editor so that he's not stumbling ober his words all the time.. or talking lessons.. lol

[DripsMetal]

@wesleyjames81

fucking LOL

[system0system0]

this video is terrible . . What the hell is he talking about . Get a job

[vaj99]

Black holes do not form wen the mass of a star collapses in on itself. they occur wen the mass of a star fuses with its invisible time dimension. all planets have invisible time dimensions. the sun has 1 enormous time dimension(as do all stars).life giving planets such as earth have more than 1 time dimension.only 2 other planets have more than 1 time door they are Mars and Venus.eventualy these 2 planets will have life on them to.

[wesleyjames81]

OMG! I'm tired of all you scientists pushing your religion on everyone! Baltimore dosent actually exist, Satan made it up to turn us all away from baby jesus! you will burn for your sins blasphemers...

[cakeeg312]

yesterday i was looking at a star thats not there anymore,... or is it?

[TBucker]

@gizme123 Troll/idiot.

[omarct]

Wow so we can see galaxies in the other side of the universe thanks to that. Amazing, I didn't even know the universe had sides.

[dilibau]

I liked the "there's a whole lot of nothing there" ... :)

Anyway, this should be taught in schools...thus we wouldn't have the Snookys and the Jersey shores of MTV...

[lookatmepleasesir]

@maydayfire probably because space isn't actually a void or a vacuum. Empty space is empty to us because its empty of the matter we're so familiar with.

[gizme123]

this is WRONG dont believe this geeek! a lightbeam that hits the black hole doesnt bounce back to our eyes , what hits the black hole doesnt come out , so a black hole is black if it were there u wouldnt see coulors as u see there its BLACK ( u cant see a black hole )

[ketjr19]

So, a black hole is, in laymens terms, my pupil in my eye.