Take a photo of a black hole

Black holes themselves do not emit light, and their strong gravity makes it difficult for light to escape and be directly detected. But scientists have discovered a "loophole" by observing accretion disks and jets. The famous "Black Hole Catcher" event horizon telescope uses an array of radio telescopes to collect weak signals from black holes. Through complex data processing and analysis, the image of the black hole is ultimately synthesized.

The unit is designed for unsupervised public use: controls are recessed or shielded, moving parts are enclosed, and the interface is operable by a child of about six with no instruction. Where a screen is used, the language can be switched without changing the hardware, and the content can be replaced on site.

Black holes are celestial bodies with strong gravitational effects, and even light cannot escape their gravitational confinement. For a long time, people have been unable to glimpse their presence. The Event Horizon Telescope is a program primarily aimed at observing supermassive black holes at the center of galaxies. This plan combines deep long baseline interferometry (VLBI) technology with radio telescopes around the world, using eight radio telescopes distributed in multiple parts of the world to jointly observe the same target source and record data, forming a virtual telescope with an aperture equivalent to the diameter of the Earth, and improving the angular resolution of the telescope to a level sufficient to observe event horizon scale structures. These 8 telescopes conducted observations for several consecutive days, followed by two years of data analysis, and finally officially released the first black hole photo in 2019. Eight radio telescopes are set up on the touch screen on the table, and as the number of telescopes placed increases during interaction, the black hole painting on the wall display screen appears.