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It's not easy growing a supermassive black hole
By Becky Smethurst on 24 October, 2024When we think of black holes, we often think of them as endless hoovers, sucking up anything around them. In reality though, it's very difficult to grow a black hole; to get matter close enough to that point of no return. Instead, most matter will happily orbit a black hole. Just like the Earth orbits the Sun, the Sun orbits a supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way over 4 million times more massive than the Sun itself. So if it’s difficult to grow a black hole, how in the universe did supermassive black holes like this get so big?
About Becky Smethurst
Dr Becky Smethurst is an award-winning astrophysicist and science communicator at the University of Oxford, specialising in how galaxies co-evolve with their supermassive black holes. Her YouTube channel, Dr Becky, has over 750,000 subscribers who engage with her videos on weird objects in space, the history of science, and monthly recaps of space news. Her latest book, A Brief History of Black Holes, was described by BBC's Sky at Night magazine as "A jaunt through space history . . .with charming wit and many pop-culture references".