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The EHT team has produced simulations of what Einstein's theories predict the hole should look like

Scientists believe they are on the verge of obtaining the first ever picture of a black hole.

By Jonathan Amos
BBC Science Correspondent, Boston


They have built an Earth-sized "virtual telescope" by linking a large array of radio receivers - from the South Pole, to Hawaii, to the Americas and Europe.


There is optimism that observations to be conducted during 5-14 April could finally deliver the long-sought prize.
In the sights of the so-called "Event Horizon Telescope" will be the monster black hole at the centre of our galaxy.
Although never seen directly, this object, catalogued as Sagittarius A*, has been determined to exist from the way it influences the orbits of nearby stars.


These race around a point in space at many thousands of km per second, suggesting the hole likely has a mass of about four million times that of the Sun.


But as colossal as that sounds, the "edge" of the black hole - the horizon inside which an immense gravity field traps all light - may be no more than 20 million km or so across.

 

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