X-Rays Reveal Superheated Gloop Surrounding a Black Hole
The Cygnus X-1 system is one of the brightest sources of X-rays in the Milky Way, consisting of a black hole called Cygnus X-1 and its giant companion, a star packing 41 times the mass of our Sun. Researchers recently measured the polarization of those X-rays to better understand the geometry of the superheated plasma…