It's out of this world

An astrophysicist with local ties helped to make a discovery that's out of this world - evidence of the youngest black hole known to exist in our cosmic neighborhood.

Daniel Patnaude, an astrophysicist at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, who grew up in Attleboro and North Attleboro, led the team of astronomers who made the discovery.

"If our interpretation is correct, this is the nearest example where the birth of a black hole has been observed," Patnaude said

There are no fears for the Earth's safety. The object is in a galaxy about 50 million light years away.

The object is a remnant of a supernova called SN 1979C, which was first discovered by an amateur astronomer in 1979.

Using NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, Patnaude and his colleagues found evidence that indicates the object they were observing could be a 30-year-old black hole. The object is much closer to Earth than the other black holes that have been detected in the universe.

"We were inspired by a talk we had here at the Smithsonian that talked about a type of supernova that have a very fast rate of decline in how bright they are," Patnaude explained. "We looked at supernova 1979C, which was the third supernova found in 1979. We went to the data archives to determine how the X-ray brightness had changed."

Data from 1995 to 2007 indicates that the brightness of the object's X-rays has been steady, an indication the object is a black hole being fed by material falling into it from the supernova, Patnaude said.

While it took 50 million light years for the information to reach Earth, observers are essentially looking at a snapshot of the object as it was at age 30.

The discovery is exciting, if correct, because it gives astronomers the ability to observe the evolution of a relatively young black hole, Patnaude said.

However, it is not a certainty that the object is a black hole. The steady X-ray emissions could also mean the object is a rapidly spinning neutron star surrounded by a wind of high energy particles and known as a pulsar wind nebula.

Patnaude said that possibility is "equally interesting." If the object is a pulsar it would be the youngest and brightest example discovered.

Patnaude, a 1991 graduate of North Attleboro High School, credits his decision to go into the field of astrophysics to experience in the school's science fair program, under former high school teacher David Vito. He worked on a project modeling the light curves in eclipsing binary stars.