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Stellar ones have a soft upper boundary. If they are so old and massive that they become planetary or even stellar sized - well the'd start drawing stealing a g
by m_mueller 10y ago
Stellar ones have a soft upper boundary. If they are so old and massive that they become planetary or even stellar sized - well the'd start drawing stealing a good chunk of the host galaxy and form their own one - with blackjack and hookers. I.e. a flickering star would be the least of your worries ;-).
- ethanbond 10y agoWhat causes the soft upper boundary?
- wbl 10y agoThe mass of the star before it went and formed a black hole. The bigger a star, the hotter it is, and the more evaporates from the surface, and the shorter it lives. Large blackholes grow through things falling into them.
- ethanbond 10y agoOh I read the parent comment as black holes having a soft upper boundary. Is that the case? Or if more stuff falls in they just get bigger (minus Hawking radiation)?
- wbl 10y agoSo there is a complication, which is space is filled with vast amounts of nothingness. For a black hole to get bigger objects need to be on a collision course with it, which is somewhat unusual. A black hole doesn't behave any differently from the same mass as something not a black hole. So once a star turns into a black hole, the accretion disk is usually remnants/maybe more if it is in a nebula. Once that's gone, that's it for growth.