Researchers have made progress in understanding the timing of jets ejected by black holes following stellar consumption, a phenomenon sometimes referred to as black holes “burping.” When stars venture too close to black holes, the extreme gravitational forces tear them apart in a process known as spaghettification. According to astrophysicist Dr Adelle Goodwin from Curtin University, black holes are inefficient feeders, with only about half of a disrupted star ultimately being consumed, while the remaining material is violently launched back into space.
The release of these jets had previously been difficult to predict, occurring at varying intervals ranging from one year to five years after a star’s destruction. A new study published in Nature Astronomy examined 20 tidal disruption events using radio telescope observations to determine when jets are launched. The research found that supermassive black holes, which range from hundreds of thousands to billions of times the sun’s mass, release jets during two distinct phases of their feeding cycle.
The first jet release occurs when black holes feed at their highest rates. The second occurs hundreds to thousands of days after a star is initially torn apart, when the feeding rate declines to approximately 2 percent of the maximum rate at which a black hole can consume material. Importantly, this same threshold is already known to trigger jet releases from smaller stellar-mass black holes, suggesting a universal pattern regardless of size.
The findings enable more precise prediction of when jets will be released, potentially improving the efficiency of astronomical observations. Dr Sara Webb from Swinburne University noted that the research demonstrates supermassive black holes behave predictably at distinct periods in their evolution and connects observations to similar patterns seen in much smaller stellar-mass black holes, advancing understanding of these extreme cosmic objects.
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