September 16, 2025 — The Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) collaboration, with major contributions from the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy (MPIfR), has unveiled new images of the supermassive black hole at the center of galaxy M87.
For the first time, the EHT detects faint emission from the base of M87’s relativistic jet, while multi-year observations from 2017 to 2021 reveal unexpected flips in polarized light, showing that magnetic fields near the black hole are dynamic and evolving.
“These results confirm Einstein’s predictions of a stable black hole shadow while revealing surprising turbulence in the surrounding magnetic fields and jet formation,” says J. Anton Zensus, founding chair of the EHT collaboration.
Upgrades to the EHT, including two new telescopes and improved calibration, enabled these unprecedented insights into how matter and energy behave in the extreme environment around a black hole, offering a new window into cosmic jets and magnetic dynamics.
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Images: New images from the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) collaboration have revealed a dynamic environment with changing polarization patterns caused by the magnetic fields of the supermassive black hole M87*. As shown in the images above, while M87*’s magnetic fields appeared to spiral in one direction in 2017, they settled in 2018 and reversed direction in 2021. The cumulative effects of this polarization change over time suggests that M87* and its surrounding environment are constantly evolving. © EHT Collaboration