Alternate Names

K16

Type

Stellar mass

Location

in the constellation Aquarius

Distance

16,000 light-years

Mass

16 times the mass of the Sun

Size

Diameter roughly 60 miles (96 km)

Discovery Methods

• Detection of an accretion disk
• Measuring the motions of a companion star

SS433

This artist's concept shows the black hole devouring its companion star. Gas from the companion flows into a disk around the black hole, where it's heated to millions of degrees. Some of this hot gas squirts into space in two high-speed "jets."

An artist's concept shows the SS433 system. The black hole is at left, surrounded by an accretion disk. Gas in the disk gets hotter as it spirals closer to the black hole. New gas flows into the disk from the supergiant companion star at right. Some of the gas in the disk is shot back into space at about one-quarter of the speed of light, forming two long jets that extend above and below the black hole.

A radio image shows the jets from SS433 forming a corkscrew pattern. The accretion disk around the black hole wobbles a bit, like a child's spinning top, so its jets squirt into space like a stream of water from a rotating sprinkler head, forming the corkscrew.

A radio image shows blobs of material carried in the jets from SS433. The image spans about 200 billion miles (325 billion km).

An X-ray image from the space-based Chandra X-Ray Observatory shows the glow of SS433's jets. The glow comes from gas that is heated to millions of degrees. The image spans half a light-year.

An animation of the precession, or "wobble,"� of the jets from the black hole in SS433.

A series of images made with radio telescopes shows blobs of material shooting outward in the SS433 jets.

This document was last modified: March 14, 2012.