Astronomers have observed perplexing alterations in a jet of highly magnetic plasma emitted by a small black hole that is consuming gas and dust. The Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope (FAST) in China detected periodic changes in the jet that occur within a fraction of a second. The black hole, known as GRS 1915+105, is formed by a regular star orbiting a stellar black hole. As the star orbits, some of its material is drawn into the black hole, while the rest is propelled into a jet emanating from the poles.

The fluctuations in the jet’s energy are believed to be caused by the misalignment of the black hole’s rotation and its accretion disk—the disk of matter orbiting the black hole. This misalignment results in a wobbling motion similar to a spinning top. When the jet points away from Earth, its energy decreases, but it returns to normal as the system rotates back.

GRS 1915+105 is classified as a microquasar, a smaller version of a quasar. Quasars are exceptionally luminous celestial objects housing supermassive black holes millions or billions of times more massive than the sun. These black holes draw in surrounding matter with their immense gravitational force, some of which falls past the event horizon, while the rest is channeled toward the poles in the form of energetic jets. Microquasars exhibit similar behavior but on a smaller scale.

These observations of quasi-periodic oscillations (QPO) in GRS 1915+105 have never been seen before in radio waves from a black hole. QPOs provide valuable insights into the physics of black holes, and this observation could enhance our understanding of the feeding patterns of smaller black holes. However, the cause of these oscillations remains a mystery.

The researchers suggest that the temporal modulation in the relativistic jet could be a result of the misalignment between the black hole’s spin axis and the disk of hot gas and dust surrounding it, a consequence of frame-dragging caused by the spin of the black hole. Further observations of this and other microquasars could help unravel the enigma behind these mysterious QPO signals. The team’s findings were published in the journal Nature.

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