Astronomers spied a super-sized black hole ejecting plumes of gas every eight days. This black hole is at the center of a galaxy located about a billion light-years away and tips the scales at about 30 million times the mass of our Sun. Ground-based telescopes caught ASASSN-20qc when it flared up in late 2020. A few weeks later Swift and other telescopes observed it in X-rays. Our NICER telescope monitored it for several months afterward, which was when astronomers noticed that the source varies

It's Black Hole Friday! This computer simulation shows a gas cloud encountering two supermassive black holes. As gravitational and frictional forces meet, the cloud condenses and heats. Each time the black holes orbit, some of the gas is ejected. Learn how scientists use data like this to improve their observations and understanding of cosmic systems: go.nasa.gov/4rrYVlp | NASA Ames Research Center