Webb telescope zooms in on a black holes messy feeding zone

Astronomers using NASA's James Webb Space Telescope have mapped where dust collects around a nearby supermassive black hole — and found that almost all of it sits in a compact ring feeding the object.

The study focuses on the Circinus galaxy, about 13 million light-years away in space. Webb’s sharp imaging made out relatively small parts of the center of the galaxy, allowing researchers to distinguish material falling in from the dust getting pushed out.

This ring, called a "torus," acts like both a fuel line and a gatekeeper: It funnels material toward the black hole while shaping how energy escapes into the surrounding galaxy. 

The discovery overturns decades of assumptions. Astronomers previously thought streams of hot matter, or outflows, produced the galaxy’s brightest infrared light. But Webb’s new observations, published in the journal Nature, reveal that roughly 87 percent of the glowing dust is concentrated in the dense disk feeding the black hole, while less than 1 percent comes out, essentially as exhaust. 

"Since the '90s, it has not been possible to explain excess infrared emissions that come from hot dust at the cores of active galaxies, meaning the models only take into account either the torus or the outflows, but cannot explain that excess," said Enrique Lopez-Rodriguez, based at the University of South Carolina and lead author of the study, in a statement.

Black holes are some of the strangest objects in the universe. Their gravity is so intense that nothing, not even light, can escape. It wasn't that long ago that astronomers debated whether they even existed. Now black holes are firmly established science — and we can see them, sort of. 

In 2019, the Event Horizon Telescope captured the first image of a black hole, located 53 million light-years away in the Messier 87 galaxy. It captured the glowing debris surrounding it, which makes the dark center — the black hole itself — visible by contrast. 

A black hole flares when gas, dust, or even a star ventures too close. Gravity tears the material apart, and as it spirals in, it heats up and emits a bright light before disappearing.

To separate the disk of Circinus' black hole from its exhaust, astronomers used Webb’s Aperture Masking Interferometer on its Near-Infrared Imager and Slitless Spectrograph. That's a long name for a tool that turns Webb into a mini telescope array, combining light through a mask of seven small openings to produce interference patterns. These patterns are then used to reconstruct sharp images of tiny, previously hidden features.

"By using an advanced imaging mode of the camera, we can effectively double its resolution over a smaller area of the sky," said co-author Joel Sanchez-Bermudez, a National University of Mexico astrophysicist, in a statement. "This allows us to see images twice as sharp." 

The team’s findings mark the first time scientists have used a space infrared interferometer for a target outside the Milky Way. Researchers say this technique can now be applied to other black holes, helping to determine whether Circinus has the exception or the rule when it comes to its black hole's behavior. 

"We need a statistical sample of black holes, perhaps a dozen or two dozen, to understand how mass in their accretion disks and their outflows relate to their power," Lopez-Rodriguez said.