Taking pictures of black holes is actually impossible. Because, we know nothing can come out of a black hole. Not even light. So what does it mean to have a picture of a black hole? The black hole continues to pull everything around it under the influence of its gravitational ball. But as far as this ball goes, it means that if there is anything outside the exact end of the ball that will not enter the black hole, the place is called event horizon. The impact of the black hole is not less in this event horizon. Rather, under the influence of a black hole, gases and matter particles move around a huge area at a tremendous speed, and become heated under pressure and become bright like stars.
So a huge ring of light is formed around the black hole. This is Event Horizon.
So even if we can't see the blackhole, we can see this event horizon. Scientists have finally succeeded in trying to see that. The location of this black hole is 55 million light-years from Earth, in the middle of Messiah's galaxy. The black hole extends over 4 trillion kilometers and is 3 million times larger than our Earth.
The National Science Foundation (NSF), a US-based science research organization, released the first images of the black hole at a press conference. The press conference was held in Washington DC, Brussels, Santiago, Shanghai, Taipei and Tokyo. The NSF also posted the picture on their Twitter page.
Photography was done by a project called Telescope (EHT) called Event Horizon. Which is made up of a network of 8 very powerful radio telescopes located on 6 continents of the world. It was possible to take pictures of black holes through those radio waves. This work started in 2016. More than two hundred scientists have worked on this study.
Now talking about how scientists took this picture from so far away?
The picture has nothing to do with distance. As the sun is far away from the earth. It takes about eight minutes for light to reach the earth from the sun. So when we look at the sun, we don't see the sun after eight minutes. Rather we see it continuously. Although it is the light eight minutes before the sun. In the same way, the light that comes to the earth from the event horizon of this black hole is the light 55 million years ago.
If the age of the earth were less than 55 million years, we would not see it. But since the earth is millions of years old, that light is always visible now. Or caught on a telescope. But that light seemed like a dot.
Now taking pictures is actually trying to understand the shape of a black hole with a single point of light at such a distance. Much like zooming the camera. But that zoom has to be billions of times (X). Which was actually considered a kind of impossibility for so long. Because, to get a picture of this resolution from the image released by NASA, at least a telescope as big as the Earth would be needed. So scientists have installed about 100 telescopes in different parts of the world. Then collect all these telescope's data for one year. Since the earth is rotating, each telescope actually takes pictures from different places at different times.
Basically the whole world is made into a telescope and this picture is taken. Collecting so much data and bringing out the results was another challenge. This picture is the result of the relentless efforts of about 200 scientists.
This is why there is so much fuss about it. This picture is a proof that people can make the impossible possible if they want to. Exactly why people climb Everest, why people swim across the English Channel, or why people memorize the names of the 108 elements of the periodic table. For the same reason. Because they fall.
Earlier, various scientists, starting with Einstein and Stephen Hawking, used mathematical data on black holes to describe them in a mathematical way. For example, about 3000 years ago, Eratosthenes measured the circumference of the earth almost accurately by measuring only the shadow of a stick. Why don't we get excited after this?