Overview

• The Hubble Space Telescope has observed twice as many novae near the plasma jet of the supermassive black hole in galaxy M87 compared to other regions.
• These novae are white dwarfs in binary systems, which erupt when their hydrogen layers explode.
• Researchers are unsure of the exact mechanism, but suspect the jet may be accelerating hydrogen delivery to the white dwarfs.
• The study, published on arXiv, highlights a previously unknown interaction between black hole jets and their surrounding stellar environments.
• This discovery underscores Hubble's unique capability to observe deep space phenomena that ground-based telescopes cannot resolve.