A white dwarf star may be changing the pulse of a supermassive black hole

A black hole that has already made people talk in the past has once again intrigued the scientific community — it changed its rhythm quite quickly, which is very rare.

X-ray radiation from the supermassive black hole 1ES 1927+654, of the constellation Draco, recorded a strange and regular rhythm, called quasi-periodic oscillationtells .

This is not the first time that this black hole has brought surprises: in 2018, scientists recorded the first recorded abrupt change in the luminosity of a black hole of this type — it went from inactive to extremely bright.

Later, this black hole shines. The phenomenon would have been caused by a star. Now, the most recent phenomenon observed in this intriguing 1ES 1927+654 is also linked to a star — dwarf, but very disruptive.

The first time scientists measured these oscillations was in 2022, and found that the X-ray glow fluctuated by 10% approximately every 18 minutes. But by 2024, this interval had decreased to every 7.1 minutes.

“He was excitingby itself, find these oscillations, because it is only one of a handful of supermassive black holes that do this”, says Megan Masterson, one of the authors of the published earlier this year.

“But I think what was most exciting for us was the fact that the period of oscillation — how quickly these oscillations were happening — was changing in human-observable time scaleswhich is not usually what we see around supermassive black holes.”

What can explain this abrupt change? One dwarf starscientists suggest.

In fact, a white dwarf star, whose matter is occasionally sucked into the black hole, “is extraordinarily close” to it, says Masterson. “AND just a small object orbiting around this gigantic monster.” But everything changed.

“It is amazing that such a small body can have such a significant impact on what we are seeing around the supermassive black hole,” says the author.

However, it has not yet been possible to confirm this theory with certainty. Other possible explanations include the existence of a deformed ring of matter called accretion disk around the black hole, or even matter waves.

O Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA), a space-based gravitational wave observatory, scheduled to launch in 2035, should be able to detect gravitational waves in millihertzwhich is what supermassive black holes produce.

By then, it should be easier to understand this black hole and its small dwarf star. Furthermore, as stated by the British astronomer Matt Nichol“everyone wants to see a white dwarf be devoured by a black hole”.