2013

Radio Detections During Two State Transitions of the Intermediate Mass Black Hole HLX-1

Webb, Natalie, Cseh, David, Lenc, Emil et al.

Understand

Relativistic jets are streams of plasma moving at appreciable fractions of the speed of light.

  • They have been observed from stellar mass black holes ($\sim$3$-$20 solar masses, M$_\odot$) as well as supermassive black holes ($\sim$10$^6$$-$10$^9$ M$_\odot$) found in the centres of most galaxies.
  • Jets should also be produced by intermediate mass black holes ($\sim$10$^2$$-$10$^5$ M$_\odot$), although evidence for this third class of black hole has until recently been weak.
  • We report the detection of transient radio emission at the location of the intermediate mass black hole candidate ESO 243-49 HLX-1, which is consistent with a discrete jet ejection event.

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