Washington, Feb 18 (ANI): A new study has indicated that jets of particles streaming from black holes in far-away galaxies operate differently and have a more complex shape than earlier believed.

The research was led by scientists at the Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology, jointly located at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and Stanford University, with participation from scientists from around the world.

The study included data from more than 20 telescopes including the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope and KANATA telescope.

High above the flat Milky Way galaxy, bright galaxies called blazars dominate the gamma-ray sky, discrete spots on the dark backdrop of the universe.

As nearby matter falls into the black hole at the center of a blazar, “feeding” the black hole, it sprays some of this energy back out into the universe as a jet of particles.

“As the universe’s biggest accelerators, blazar jets are important to understand,” said KIPAC Research Fellow Masaaki Hayashida.

“But how they are produced and how they are structured is not well understood. We’re still looking to understand the basics,” he added.

Researchers had previously theorized that such jets are held together by strong magnetic field tendrils, while the jet’s light is created by particles revolving around these wisp-thin magnetic field “lines.”

Yet, until now, the details have been relatively poorly understood.

The recent study upsets the prevailing understanding of the jet’s structure, revealing new insight into these mysterious yet mighty beasts.

“This work is a significant step toward understanding the physics of these jets,” said KIPAC Director Roger Blandford.

“It’s this type of observation that is going to make it possible for us to figure out their anatomy,” he added.

Over a full year of observations, the researchers focused on one particular blazar jet, located in the constellation Virgo, monitoring it in many different wavelengths of light: gamma-ray, X-ray, optical, infrared and radio.

Blazars continuously flicker, and researchers expected continual changes in all types of light.

Midway through the year, however, researchers observed a spectacular change in the jet’s optical and gamma-ray emission: a 20-day-long flare in gamma rays was accompanied by a dramatic change in the jet’s optical light.

During the 20-day gamma-ray flare, optical light streaming from the jet changed its polarization.

This temporal connection between changes in the gamma-ray light and changes in the optical light suggests that both types of light are created in the same geographical region of the jet.

During those 20 days, something in the local environment altered to cause both the optical and gamma-ray light to vary. (ANI)