Learning about gravity from imaging supermassive black holes

by Luciano Rezzolla (Goethe University Frankfurt (DE))

Wednesday 24 Sept 2025, 14:00 → 15:00 Europe/Zurich

4/3-006 - TH Conference Room (CERN)

I will discuss how the first images of the supermassive black holes M87* and Sgr A* were obtained by the EHT collaboration. In particular, I will describe the theoretical aspects that have allowed us to model the dynamics of the plasma accreting onto the black hole and how the comparison between the theoretical images and the observations on a broad range of frequencies has allowed us to deduce the presence of supermassive black holes and to extract information about the accretion process. In addition, I will describe the lessons we have learned from these imaging process about strong-field gravity and alternatives to black holes.

CERN_colloquium_0925_rezzolla.pdf

Recording