Cosmic Donut

The big science news of the day is the development of the first concrete image of a black hole, assembled from data accumulated by the Event Horizon Telescope array using an algorithm developed by MIT grad student Katie Bouman. The image shows the bright, superheated accretion disc surrounding the dark black hole at the center:

In various Secret Science Club writeups, I have written about the black holes that the lecturers have discussed in their talks. It's nice to see a confirmation of the theoretical models, with the bright accretion disc appearing as a halo, or a cosmic donut, around the event horizon of the black hole, inside which not even light can escape the gravity. Science works, science funding is crucial, and the fact that science funding, and even scientific research (and scientists themselves) come under attack by regressive forces is infuriating.

But let us not dwell on earthbound ingnorance, this day is a day for celebration:





While black holes may suck, science certainly doesn't!