The Grainger College of Engineering

PODCAST: Physics professor Charles Gammie on his team's role in capturing the first images of a black hole

5/20/2019 Mike Koon, Marketing and Communications Coordinator

On April 10, astronomers announced that they had captured the first images of a black hole through the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) – a planet scale array of eight ground based radio telescopes forged through international collaboration. The black hole itself is at the Center of M87 galaxy, in the Virgo Galaxy Cluster. University of Illinois Physics Professor Charles Gammie, is a member of the EHT Science Council and co-led a group which provided the theoretical analysis. The team developed sophisticated computer code to make running and analyzing the simulations as efficient as possible. Professor Gammie joins Illinois Innovators to discuss the significance of the discovery, the role the Illinois team played in the project, and what’s next. 

Written by Mike Koon, Marketing and Communications Coordinator

On April 10, astronomers announced that they had captured the first images of a black hole through the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) – a planet scale array of eight ground based radio telescopes forged through international collaboration. The black hole itself is at the Center of M87 galaxy, in the Virgo Galaxy Cluster. University of Illinois Physics Professor Charles Gammie, is a member of the EHT Science Council and co-led a group which provided the theoretical analysis. The team developed sophisticated computer code to make running and analyzing the simulations as efficient as possible. Professor Gammie joins Illinois Innovators to discuss the significance of the discovery, the role the Illinois team played in the project, and what’s next. 

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This story was published May 20, 2019.