Black Holes

You could say that a black hole is the space equivalent of a tornado. Except nothing can escape from it. NOTHING. Not even light. These strange things sometimes form after a supernova (the explosion of a large star). All the star's remaining matter is squeezed into an incredibly small space. The resulting black hole is so dense that a piece of it the size of a pin head would weigh more than a jumbo jet!

Surrounding the black hole is an imaginary sphere called the "event horizon". Anything passing into this sphere, even light, has no hope of escaping the black hole at its centre. All its mass is squeezed into the black hole, making it even denser. Over time, the black hole will slowly leak out its mass, fading away into nothing.

Scientists think that a black hole may be able to warp space-time enough to create wormholes. A wormhole is a portal that can be travelled through to get to one part of the universe to another in mere seconds. I'm confusing you, aren't I? Let's try it this way. Grab a piece of paper. Look at its sides. They're far away from each other, aren't they? Now bend the sides toward each other. Now they're closer together. This is how a wormhole works. The bent surface of the paper is warped space-time. The two sides that are close to each other are now connected to each other by a wormhole. There is no direct evidence that wormholes exist.

And that is the fascinating, curious, and slightly scary story of black holes. I hope you enjoyed!