Astronomers, expecting a gamma ray burst, instead discovered an extremely distant black hole that is regularly destroy stars.
This ominous form of stellar destruction is called a tidal disruption event , which occurs when unwitting stars bumble just a little too close to a black hole, where the cosmic monster's immensely powerful and destructive gravity can make short work of them despite their incredible mass.
But apparently, even black holes can need to belch after a heavy meal. Around one percent of the time, a TDE causes jets of plasma and radiation to shoot out from both of a black hole's poles, like a cosmic laser beam through a bullseye.The rarity of observing a TDE is why it's so fortuitous that this black hole's jet pointed toward the Earth.
When the matter from the jet was first detected, astronomers initially expected a gamma ray burst, one of the brightest and most energetic explosions of energy in the universe, to be the cause.
No doubt that astronomers are hungry as well to learn more about these elusive TDEs — and this discovery just might be their meal ticket.
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