6 ms·
Yes (and good question!). From the article: "The initial binary was composed of two stellar-mass black holes with a source-frame primary mass m1 14.2 M⊙, secon
by rubidium 10y ago
Yes (and good question!). From the article:
"The initial binary was composed of two stellar-mass black
holes with a source-frame primary mass m1 14.2 M⊙,
secondary mass m2 7.5 M⊙, and a total mass of
21.8 M⊙. The binary merged into a black hole of mass
20.8 M⊙, radiating 1.0M⊙ in gravitational waves."
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- semi-extrinsic 10y agoFor reference, one solar mass of radiation is about the same as the output from a gamma ray burst, or about 2000 times the output from a supernova. Or in less sensical units, the energy from detonating 1% of our galaxy's mass worth of TNT.
- dsqrt 10y agoGamma-ray bursts emission is strongly beamed into a small solid angle. So, although their equivalent isotropic energies (that is the energy that would be needed to power gamma-ray bursts if the emission was isotropic) are huge, the actual energies released in gamma-ray bursts are more or less compatible with those of supernovae (~0.1% of a solar mass).
- Scarblac 10y agoAs usual, XKCD provides some help to understand how much energy a supernova is: "Which of the following would be brighter, in terms of the amount of energy delivered to your retina: 1. A supernova, seen from as far away as the Sun is from the Earth, or 2. The detonation of a hydrogen bomb pressed against your eyeball? Answer: the supernova, by nine orders of magnitude." https://what-if.xkcd.com/73/ https://what-if.xkcd.com/73/