Black Holes
Roger Penrose, Reinhard Genzel & Andrea Ghez
About This Prize
The 2020 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded with one half to Roger Penrose “for the discovery that black hole formation is a robust prediction of the general theory of relativity” and the other half jointly to Reinhard Genzel and Andrea Ghez “for the discovery of a supermassive compact object at the centre of our galaxy.” Penrose’s groundbreaking 1965 singularity theorem used ingenious mathematical methods to prove that black holes are a direct consequence of general relativity, while Genzel and Ghez each led groups that tracked stellar orbits near the center of the Milky Way for decades, providing the most convincing evidence that Sagittarius A* is a supermassive black hole of approximately four million solar masses.
Roger Penrose
“Black Holes, Cosmology, and Space-Time Singularities”
Andrea Ghez
“A Forty Year Journey”
Reinhard Genzel
“From the Possibility to the Certainty of a Supermassive Black Hole”
Key Concepts
- • Penrose Singularity Theorem: Using the concept of trapped surfaces, Penrose proved mathematically that singularities are an inevitable consequence of gravitational collapse under general relativity
- • Sgr A*: The supermassive black hole at the Galactic Center with a mass of approximately 4 million solar masses, identified through decades of stellar orbit observations
- • Stellar Orbit Tracking: By monitoring the orbits of stars around the Galactic Center over decades using adaptive optics, Genzel and Ghez provided definitive proof of a supermassive compact object
- • Event Horizon Telescope: The global interferometric array that captured the first direct image of a black hole shadow (M87* in 2019, Sgr A* in 2022), providing stunning visual confirmation