A star ‘repeatedly shredded and consumed’ by a black hole around 500m light years away spotted by astronomers

A star resembling our sun, located approximately 500 million light years away, is undergoing a process of being “repeatedly shredded and consumed” by a black hole, as observed by astronomers.

The dramatic event produces regular outbursts of light approximately every 25 days, and scientists from the University of Leicester have been able to document these occurrences.

Typically, black hole outbursts, often referred to as tidal disruption events, happen when a star is consumed by a black hole. However, the repeated emissions in this case indicate that the star is only partially destroyed and then shredded repeatedly.

In cases of repeated star shredding, two types of outbursts are observed – those that occur annually and those that happen every few hours. In this instance, the regularity of emissions falls between the two categories, according to the research team.

The star known as Swift J0230, instead of following an expected decay pattern, brightens for seven to 10 days and then abruptly goes dark, repeating the process every 25 days based on observations.

The researchers believe their work, published in the journal Nature Astronomy, provides a crucial piece of the puzzle in understanding how stars in orbit are disrupted by black holes.

Dr. Robert Eyles-Ferris, who recently completed his PhD at the University of Leicester, stated, “In most of the systems we’ve seen in the past, the star is completely destroyed. Swift J0230 is an exciting addition to the class of partially disrupted stars.”

Dr. Phil Evans from the University of Leicester School of Physics and Astronomy, and the lead author of the study, noted, “This is the first time we’ve seen a star like our sun being repeatedly shredded and consumed by a low-mass black hole.”

Models of the Swift J0230 outburst suggest that the star is similar in size to our sun and follows an elliptical orbit near a low-mass black hole situated at the center of its galaxy. Calculations indicate that material equivalent to the mass of three Earths has been torn from Swift J0230’s atmosphere and heated as it falls into the black hole.

The resulting intense heat, estimated to reach around 2,000,000°C (3,600,000°F), emits a substantial amount of X-rays, which were initially detected by NASA’s Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory. Researchers estimate the black hole to be approximately 10,000 to 100,000 times the mass of the sun, classifying it as a supermassive black hole of smaller size.