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Supermassive Black Hole in M87

Supermassive Black Hole in M87
Supermassive Black Hole

Supermassive black hole at the heart of the galaxy M87.

Credit: Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration

In the April 2019 public planetarium shows, we featured the fulldome film From Earth to the Universe. We also talked about the exciting announcement from the previous week — the first image of a black hole. Black holes are hard to wrap your brain around. Below you will find links to help you understand what you are seeing in the image.

  • Article on the Event Horizon Telescope website explaining the image.
  • Zoom in video from viewing the entire galaxy down to the center of the galaxy where the black hole is found.
  • Excellent video from Veritasium explaining what we are seeing in the image. This is from before the announcement was made, and isn't referring directly to M87, but still very helpful. He has also produced an update video after the announcement.