Even though black holes hold their title as
being the king of the universe, are they immortal?
Well, let’s get an overview of what a black
hole really is.
A black hole is a region of space time exhibiting
gravitational acceleration so strong that
nothing the size of an atom can escape it,
even light.
They are created by collapsing of huge stars
20 times the size of our star.
After the implosion, there is a colossal explosion
releasing a huge burst of gamma rays that
can wipe out life on our planet.
What’s left is a black hole with mass identical
to what was once a star.
Any planets still orbiting around the black
hole won’t be spaghettified, they will orbit
the black hole normally like it has been doing
for years.
This is cool and all, but what does a black
hole actually look like?
Well here is a photo of an actual black hole
in the center of the galaxy Messier 87.
Black holes are actually invisible because
light can’t escape it, so the red you see
is matter being spun at extremely high speeds
around the black hole, the friction is causing
heat which then results in x-ray radiation
to disperse and eventually be captured by
our advance telescopes.
This black hole is 55 million light years
away, and like all black holes, has singularity
and an event horizon.
The singularity is where all the matter in
a black hole gets compressed into.
They say it’s a point of infinite density
at the center of a black hole but that theory
may be wrong because this is what classical
physics tells us and classical physics begin
to break down in the science of singularity.
The event horizon of a black hole is the zone
which light cannot escape once inside this
boundary.
The reason for this is because this zone’s
gravity is so high.
Once matter is trapped in this zone, it will
then be taken into the singularity.
Now that we got this out of the way, let’s
conclude if black holes are mortal or immortal?
Actually, they are mortal.
Yup, they die eventually like everything else
in the universe.
How?
Well like the event horizon we discussed about,
things escape from there occasionally more
or less depending on the size of the black
hole.
For an example: the smaller the black hole,
the more radiation given off, the bigger,
the less.
Size effects radiation because smaller black
holes are a lot more active than slow huge
black holes.
As this goes on and on as the black hole is
no longer being fed matter, it will spit out
all of the matter it absorbed in a form of
radiation.
This is called black hole evaporation, also
known as hawking radiation.
So, how do particles escape from black holes
anyway?
Well subatomic particles will pop into existence
in pairs in empty space which isn’t really
empty because it is filled with subatomic
particles - one from the pair is a particle
and the other is an antiparticle.
They both have the same mass, just different
characteristics like their electrical charge.
They will annihilate each other when they
meet into contact from their opposite charges
causing attraction, this process is called
annihilation.
Once they come together, they will turn into
pure energy.
When this cycle attempts to happen right on
the edge of a black hole, which ever particle
is closer in the black hole gets pulled in
and the other particle is free from its suicidal
partner and has enough force, or in other
words, push, to barely escape the black hole’s
attraction.
This doesn’t always happen though; sometimes
both of the particles get pulled back in.
If a particle does escape, then the black
hole will lose the mass of the particle that
escaped.
Since the matter escaped and was once part
of the black holes empty space, the black
hole has now lost mass.
This process continues forever and ever till
the black hole loses enough mass to evaporate
at an exponentially incredible fast rate till
it heats up and explodes to an equivalent
of 1 million metric ton hydrogen bombs.
This will be how all kings of the galaxy end…
