Star Survives Close Call With Black Hole

Credits: X-ray: NASA/CXO/CSIC-INTA/G.Miniutti et al.; Illustration: NASA/CXC/M. Weiss;

astronomers may have discovered a new kind of survival story: a star had a brush with a black hole and lived to tell the tale. Data from NASA’s Chandra X – ray Observatory and ESA’s XMM – Newton, uncovered the account that began with a red giant star wandering too close to a supermassive black hole. The black hole, located in a galaxy called GSN 069, has about the mass of 400,000 suns, on the small side of the supermassive black hole scale. once the red giant was captured, the outer layers of the star were stripped and careened toward the black hole, leaving the core of the star (a white dwarf) behind. The white dwarf has not escaped but instead is on an elliptical orbit around the black hole, orbiting every 9 hours! on its closest approach, the black hole will strip off its outer layers. eventually, the white dwarf will be stripped of its layers, and will become a planet! now, there is ONE reason we want to find out more about this: we want to live on it someday! (well, DUH) (ps, I’m just kidding about this). living on a ex. white dwarf orbiting a black hole would be AWESOME impractical.