Hunting for Light from Black Hole Crumbs ⚡ экспресс
To test Hawking's prediction of black hole radiation, a study was conducted of gamma-ray bursts that could accompany the evaporation of hypothetical black holes of asteroid masses ('crumbs'), presumably formed during binary black hole mergers. Analysis of data from the Fermi-LAT gamma-ray space telescope, recorded after the gravitational-wave event GW170814 (merger of two black holes with masses ~31 and 25 M⊙), revealed no statistically significant delayed gamma signals. This allowed setting upper limits on the masses of the crumbs: the hypothesis of their formation with a characteristic mass of 4×10^8 kg and total radiation equivalent to one solar mass is ruled out at a 95% confidence level. The obtained limits provide a benchmark for future searches using the growing catalog of gravitational events and more sensitive instruments, such as the Cherenkov Telescope Array Observatory, which will be able to probe evaporation bursts at late stages.
The merger of giant black holes resembles the collision of raindrops: the impact splashes out tiny black hole crumbs with the mass of an asteroid. According to Hawking's theory, all black holes evaporate, losing mass. Regular holes take billions of years to evaporate, but lightweight crumbs need only moments: their death is a flash of gamma rays, invisible to the eye but carrying colossal energy.
Sifting through the Fermi telescope archive after the black hole merger GW170814 (recorded by gravitational wave detectors that sense ripples in space), scientists looked for delayed gamma-ray bursts — the farewell signals of the crumbs. Nothing.
The absence of signals allowed them to rule out a scenario in which crumbs of 400,000 tons are born: that mass, squeezed into a point smaller than an atom, equals the weight of three oil tankers.
More sensitive next-generation telescopes will increase the chances of catching these instantaneous flashes.
🎯 Regular black holes are cosmic vacuum cleaners, but black hole crumbs are more like fireflies: they don't suck in, they evaporate, blinking farewell.
🎬 In the TV series 'Stargate', ultra-small black holes were used as weapons or sources of unimaginable energy—alas, in reality we haven't caught them yet.