Supermassive Black Holes

00:00:21 one that is set to overturn our understanding of how the Universe formed

00:02:27 We see our galaxy, the Milky Way

00:03:59 how galaxies formed out of the, the ionised hot gas

00:06:14 It even destroys the very fabric of the Universe.

00:08:08 These are amongst the brightest objects in the Universe.

00:09:44 it is actually impossible to see if there's a black hole in the middle

00:11:58 So for this comparison he chose the very ordinary galaxy next door to us

00:13:29 because of the influence of a great mass in the centre

00:15:55 but worryingly it wasn't in some far-off active galaxy.

00:17:45 it's a dense cluster of something else that's dark, that's not a black hole.

00:19:44 but Hubble was finding them everywhere

00:21:31 which was just stars and gas and dust and nothing particularly exotic.

00:23:29 It's like looking through a pond

00:24:54 Lying at the centre of this necklace of spinning stars is a supermassive black hole.

00:26:45 but what this was a mystery scientists would have to wait three years to solve.

00:28:36 Sigma is the speed at which the stars are circling in the outer reaches of the galaxy.

00:30:05 a clear pattern started to emerge.

00:31:49 This correlation's the most important thing

00:33:31 to form a giant black hole.

00:35:22 and driving the surrounding gas away like a snowplough.

00:37:07 then it must mean that all giant black holes and their galaxies are connected from birth.

00:38:37 One idea that I'm particularly intrigued by at the moment

00:40:31 The Andromeda galaxy is actually falling towards the Milky Way . . .

00:42:38 Two possible fates await us.