The first ever coloring page based on an actual image of a black hole!
A black hole is a massive object (or region) in space that is so dense that within a certain distance, nothing can escape from its intense gravitational field, not even light.
This black hole is at the center of the galaxy Messier 87 (M87). It’s 55 million light years away, so we’re seeing it as it was 55 million years ago; that’s how long light takes to get here from M87.
The black hole is the oval shape in the center — it’s about the size of our solar system. The image shows radiation from matter that is close to the black hole, but not close enough to have been captured. The colors surrounding the black hole aren’t what we would actually see; they represent the intensity of the radiation from each location.
Credit: EHT Collaboration.
The original image (thumbnail to the right) was produced by the Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration using data from eight radio telescopes, in Arizona, Chile, Hawaii, Mexico, and Spain, and at the South Pole. You can base your colors on the original color coding — or change the colors if you prefer!