Mantegna Noli me tangerePerrault A Water NymphWatts Ariadne on the Island of NaxosPerrault Love and Innocence
Caption: Artist's rendition of a hypervelocity star leaving a galaxy. Credit: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
9. Black HolesSpeaking of black holes, what could be stranger?
Beyond a black hole's gravitational border -- or event horizon -- neither matter nor light can escape. Astrophysicists think dying stars about three to 20 times the mass of the sun can form these strange objects. At the center of galaxies, black holes about 10,000 to 18 billion times heavier than the sun are thought to exist, enlarged by gobbling up gas, dust, stars and small black holes.
What about mid-sized types? Perhaps surprisingly, evidence is both scarce and questionable for their existence.
Caption: Conception of a black hole pulling gas off of a nearby star. Credit: ESA/NASA
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