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Speaking of the Devil

21 June 2026
Astronomy, cosmology

Speaking of the Devil, black holes popped up again shortly after I put up the previous post. See https://phys.org/news/2026-06-powerful-ufo-blasting-distant-black.html … a powerful UFO spotted blasting from a distant black hole. UFO here has nothing to do with strange goings on within Earth’s atmosphere. It is an acronym for Ultra Fast Outflow. A cosmological UFO in the far reaches of outer space. Described here as a hyper luminous quasar at cosmic noon with two distinct wind components blasting away from the reputed black hole [at the galactic centre]. Wind and energy in combination. Remind you of anything?

It is the winds that are the ultra fast outflow component, rather than just the luminosity of the event, as they ramp away from the accretion disc. These UFOs also leave their fingerprint in the X-ray spectra. They also contain highly ionised iron in the outflow gas. See also https://doi.org/10.48550/arxiv.2606.05312

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