Detection of the Intrinsic Size of Sagittarius A* through Closure Amplitude Imaging (includes Online Supporting Material)

Abstract

We have detected the intrinsic size of Sagittarius A*, the Galactic Center radio source associated with a supermassive black hole, showing that the short-wavelength radio emission arises from very near the event horizon of the black hole. Radio observations with the Very Long Baseline Array show that the source has a size of $24\pm 2$ Schwarzschild radii at 7 mm wavelength. In one of eight 7-mm epochs we also detect an increase in the intrinsic size of $60_{-17}^{+25}$%. These observations place a lower limit to the mass density of Sgr A* of $1.4\times 10^4$ solar masses per cubic astronomical unit.

Accepted for publication in Science. Includes the supporting online material that accompanies the main article, which describe further details of the analysis of this experiment

References in corpus (24)

• Viewing the Shadow of the Black Hole at the Galactic Center
• The First Measurement of Spectral Lines in a Short-Period Star Bound to the Galaxy's Central Black Hole: A Paradox of Youth
• Nonthermal Electrons in Radiatively Inefficient Accretion Flow Models of Sagittarius A*
• Near-infrared flares from accreting gas around the supermassive black hole at the Galactic Centre
• Rapid X-ray flaring from the direction of the supermassive black hole at the Galactic Centre
• The Supermassive Black Hole at the Galactic Center
• Advection-Dominated Accretion Model of Sagittarius A*: Evidence for a Black Hole at the Galactic Center
• Stellar dynamics in the central arcsecond of our galaxy
• Variable Infrared Emission from the Supermassive Black Hole at the Center of the Milky Way
• Interferometric Detection of Linear Polarization from Sagittarius A* at 230 GHz
• The Proper Motion of SgrA*: I. First VLBA Results
• Dynamical Constraints On Alternatives To Massive Black Holes In Galactic Nuclei
• The simultaneous spectrum of Sgr A* from 20cm to 1mm and the nature of the mm-excess
• Intrinsic Size OF Sgr A*: 72 Schwarzschild Radii
• Variability of Sagittarius A* - Flares at 1 Millimeter
• Hyperstrong Radio-Wave Scattering in the Galactic Center. II. A Likelihood Analysis of Free Electrons in the Galactic Center
• Proper Motion of the Compact, Nonthermal Radio Source in the Galactic Center, Sagittarius a*
• The Spectrum and Variability of Circular Polarization in Sagittarius A* from 1.4 to 15 GHz
• Structure of Sagittarius A* at 86 GHz using VLBI Closure Quantities
• Covariant Magnetoionic Theory I: Ray Propagation
• The jet model for Sgr A*: radio and X-ray spectrum
• VLBA Observations of Astrometric Reference Sources in the Galactic Center
• Detection of Sagittarius A* at 330 MHz with the Very Large Array
• The Discovery of Sgr A*

Cited by in corpus (133)

• First Sagittarius A* Event Horizon Telescope Results. I. The Shadow of the Supermassive Black Hole in the Center of the Milky Way
• The Galaxy in Context: Structural, Kinematic and Integrated Properties
• Hot Accretion Flows Around Black Holes
• The Galactic Center Massive Black Hole and Nuclear Star Cluster
• Event-horizon-scale structure in the supermassive black hole candidate at the Galactic Centre
• The Proper Motion of Sgr A*: II. The Mass of Sgr A*
• SINFONI in the Galactic Center: young stars and IR flares in the central light month
• First Sagittarius A* Event Horizon Telescope Results. V. Testing Astrophysical Models of the Galactic Center Black Hole
• First Sagittarius A* Event Horizon Telescope Results. III: Imaging of the Galactic Center Supermassive Black Hole
• First Sagittarius A* Event Horizon Telescope Results. II. EHT and Multi-wavelength Observations, Data Processing, and Calibration
• Radiative Models of Sgr A* from GRMHD Simulations
• Stellar Processes Near the Massive Black Hole in the Galactic Center
• The structure of the nuclear stellar cluster of the Milky Way
• A size of ~1 AU for the radio source Sgr A* at the centre of the Milky Way
• Black Holes in Astrophysics
• An X-ray, IR, and Submillimeter Flare of Sagittarius A*
• Electron Heating in Hot Accretion Flows
• 1.3 mm Wavelength VLBI of Sagittarius A*: Detection of Time-Variable Emission on Event Horizon Scales
• Interferometric Measurements of Variable 340 GHz Linear Polarization in Sagittarius A*
• Evidence for X-ray synchrotron emission from simultaneous mid-IR to X-ray observations of a strong Sgr A* flare
• Polarimetry of near-infrared flares from Sagittarius A*
• The Intrinsic Size of Sagittarius A* from 0.35 cm to 6 cm
• BlackHoleCam: fundamental physics of the Galactic center
• Methods for detecting flaring structures in Sagittarius A* with high frequency VLBI
• The Event Horizon of Sagittarius A*
• Testing General Relativity with the Event Horizon Telescope
• Observational appearance of inefficient accretion flows and jets in 3D GRMHD simulations: Application to Sgr~A*
• High energy gamma rays from the massive black hole in the Galactic Center
• A General Relativistic Null Hypothesis Test with Event Horizon Telescope Observations of the black-hole shadow in Sgr A*
• Frequency-Dependent Shift in the Image Centroid of the Black Hole at the Galactic Center as a Test of General Relativity
• Towards the event horizon -- the supermassive black hole in the Galactic Center
• The Flare Activity of SgrA*; New Coordinated mm to X-Ray Observations
• Coupled jet-disk model for Sgr A*: explaining the flat-spectrum radio core with GRMHD simulations of jets
• The Size, Shape, and Scattering of Sagittarius A* at 86 GHz: First VLBI with ALMA
• On The Nature of the Compact Dark Mass at the Galactic Center
• Simultaneous Multi-Wavelength Observations of Sgr A* during 2007 April 1-11
• Measuring mass and angular momentum of black holes with high-frequency quasi-periodic oscillations
• How to hide large scale outflows: size constraints on the jets of Sgr A*
• The Scattering and Intrinsic Structure of Sagittarius A* at Radio Wavelengths
• The Angular Broadening of the Galactic Center Pulsar SGR J1745-29: A New Constraint on the Scattering Medium
• Electron Acceleration around the Supermassive Black Hole at the Galactic Center
• Prospects for testing the nature of Sgr A*'s NIR flares on the basis of current VLT- and future VLTI-observations
• General relativistic magnetohydrodynamical $\kappa$-jet models for Sgr A*
• Intra-day Variability of Sagittarius A* at 3 Millimeters
• Variable Linear Polarization from Sagittarius A*: Evidence for a Hot Turbulent Accretion Flow
• The Rotation Measure and 3.5mm Polarization of Sgr A*
• Imaging an Event Horizon: Mitigation of Scattering Toward Sagittarius A*
• A Possible Rossby Wave Instability Origin for the Flares in Sagittarius A*
• Detection of intrinsic source structure at ~3 Schwarzschild radii with Millimeter-VLBI observations of SAGITTARIUS A*
• The Position of Sagittarius A*: III. Motion of the Stellar Cusp
• ALMA Polarimetry of Sgr A*: Probing the Accretion Flow from the Event Horizon to the Bondi Radius
• Simulations of imaging the event horizon of Sagittarius A* from space
• Black Hole Shadow Image and Visibility Analysis of Sagittarius A*
• TeV Emission from the Galactic Center Black-Hole Plerion
• Galactic Center Research: Manifestations of the Central Black Hole
• Jet-lag in Sgr A*: What size and timing measurements tell us about the central black hole in the Milky Way
• The Proper Motion of the Galactic Center Pulsar Relative to Sagittarius A*
• ALMA and VLA measurements of frequency-dependent time lags in Sagittarius A*: evidence for a relativistic outflow
• Evidence for A Parsec-scale Jet from The Galactic Center Black Hole: Interaction with Local Gas
• Hot Accretion With Conduction: Spontaneous Thermal Outflows
• Stochastic Acceleration in the Galactic Center HESS Source
• Simultaneous Multi-Wavelength Observations of Sgr A*
• Intra-Day Variation of Sagittarius A* at Short Millimeter Wavelengths
• The Intrinsic Two-Dimensional Size of Sagittarius A*
• The Location of the Core in M81
• Discovery of Substructure in the Scatter-Broadened Image of Sgr A*
• Multiwavelength VLBI observations of Sagittarius A*
• Modeling mm- to X-ray flare emission from SgrA*
• Quasi-Periodic Flares from Star-Accretion Disc Collisions
• EHT-HOPS pipeline for millimeter VLBI data reduction
• A Radio Transient 0.1 pc from Sagittarius A*
• The Size of the Radio-Emitting Region in Low-luminosity Active Galactic Nuclei
• Sub-milliarcsecond Imaging of SgrA* and M87
• The extreme luminosity states of Sagittarius A*
• Spectral and Imaging properties of Sgr A* from High-Resolution 3D GRMHD Simulations with Radiative Cooling
• A New Perspective of the Radio Bright Zone at The Galactic Center: Feedback from Nuclear Activities
• Spectral Energy Distribution of the inner accretion flow around Sgr A* -- Clue for a weak outflow in the innermost region
• Understanding the Radio Variability of Sgr A*
• VLBI observations of weak sources using fast frequency switching
• Faraday Rotation in Global Accretion Disk Simulations: Implications for Sgr A*
• Testing RIAF model for Sgr A* using the size measurements
• Unveiling the nature of SgrA* with the geodesic motion of S-stars
• Observing supermassive black holes in virtual reality
• Modelling the black hole silhouette in Sgr A* with ion tori
• Testing the Accretion Flow with Plasma Wave Heating Mechanism for Sagittarius a* by the 1.3MM Vlbi Measurements
• The Variability of Polarized Radiation from Sgr A*
• From Multiwavelength to Mass Scaling: Accretion and Ejection in Microquasars and AGN
• Gamma rays from the Galactic Centre region: a review
• The Galactic Center as a laboratory for theories of gravity and dark matter
• The Intrinsic Shape of Sagittarius A* at 3.5-mm Wavelength
• Rapid Intrinsic Variability of Sgr A* at Radio Wavelengths
• A time-dependent jet model for the emission from Sagittarius A*
• Detection of the Sgr A* activity at 3.8 and 4.8 microns with NACO
• The intrinsic structure of Sagittarius A* at 1.3 cm and 7 mm
• Wisps in the Galactic center: NIR triggered observations of the radio source Sgr A* at 43 GHz
• Persistent Non-Gaussian Structure in the Image of Sagittarius A* at 86 GHz
• Limits on the Position Wander of Sgr A*
• MeqSilhouette : A mm-VLBI observation and signal corruption simulator
• High Resolution Radio Astronomy Using Very Long Baseline Interferometry
• Polarization images of accretion flow around supermassive black holes: imprints of toroidal field structure
• Flares and variability from Sagittarius A*: five nights of simultaneous multi-wavelength observations
• Linearly and Circularly Polarized Emission in Sagittarius A*
• Multi-Epoch VERA Observations of Sagittarius A*: I. Images and Structural Variability
• No asymmetric outflows from Sagittarius A* during the pericenter passage of the gas cloud G2
• Tracing the Milky Way's Vestigial Nuclear Jet
• Probing spacetime around Sagittarius A* using modeled VLBI closure phases
• Imaging black holes: past, present and future
• Radio Linear and Circular Polarization from M81*
• VLBI imaging of black holes via second moment regularization
• Micro-arcsecond structure of Sagittarius A* revealed by high-sensitivity 86 GHz VLBI observations
• First Space-VLBI Observations of Sagittarius A*
• Accretion models of Sgr A*
• Three-dimensional Radiative Properties of Hot Accretion Flows onto the Galactic Centre Black Hole
• Spin-Induced Disk Precession in Sagittarius A*
• Analytical solution for the structure of ADAFs
• An independent hybrid imaging of Sgr A* from the data in EHT 2017 observations
• Approaching the event horizon: 1.3mm VLBI of SgrA*
• Long-Term Radio Modulation in Sagittarius A* from Spin-Induced Disk Precession
• Very Large Array multi-band monitoring observations of M 31*
• Long-term monitoring of Sgr A* at 7 mm with VERA and KaVA
• Reconstruction of Static Black Hole Images Using Simple Geometric Forms
• High-resolution Millimeter-VLBI Imaging of Sgr A*
• Correlation between 3:2 QPO pairs and Jets in Black Hole X-ray Binaries
• Trigonometric parallax and proper motion of Sagittarius A* measured by VERA using the new broad-band back-end system OCTAVE-DAS
• On the Origin of the Wide HI Absorption Line Toward Sgr A*
• Monitoring the Size and Flux Density of Sgr A* during the Active State in 2019 with East Asian VLBI Network
• The Jet in the Galactic Center: An Ideal Laboratory for Magnetohydrodynamics and General Relativity
• High-frequency VLBI observations of SgrA* during a multi-frequency campaign in May 2007
• The Galactic Center
• Detecting Black Hole Occultations by Stars with Space Interferometric Telescopes
• Jets at lowest mass accretion rates
• The Core-shift of Sagittarius A* as a Discriminant between Disk and Jet Emission Models with millimeter-VLBI
• Multiobjective optimization for scattering mitigation and scattering screen reconstruction in VLBI observations of the Galactic Center