For decades, physicists believed black hole explosions were rare cosmic events, happening maybe once every 100,000 years. But a groundbreaking study from the University of Massachusetts Amherst flips that assumption on its head, with a bold prediction: there’s a more than 90% chance we’ll witness one within the next ten years.
And not just any black hole. This would be the first-ever observed explosion of a primordial black hole (PBH), a theoretical type born less than a second after the Big Bang. If spotted, it could unlock the deepest secrets of the universe.
“We believe that there is up to a 90% chance of witnessing an exploding PBH in the next 10 years,” says Aidan Symons, co-author and graduate student in physics at UMass Amherst.
Unlike the black holes formed from dying stars, PBHs are thought to have emerged from the chaotic energy of the early universe. They’re incredibly dense, yet much lighter than their stellar cousins. And thanks to Stephen Hawking’s 1970 prediction, we know they can emit particles through Hawking radiation, a slow leak that gets faster as the black hole gets hotter, until it explodes.
“The lighter a black hole is, the hotter it should be and the more particles it will emit. As PBHs evaporate, they become ever lighter and hotter, emitting even more radiation in a runaway process until they explode. It’s that Hawking radiation that our telescopes can detect,” says Andrea Thamm, assistant professor of physics at UMass Amherst.
The team’s breakthrough came from rethinking old assumptions. Using a “dark-QED toy model”, a mirror version of electromagnetism featuring a heavy, hypothetical dark electron, they explored what happens if PBHs carry a small electric charge.
“We make a different assumption,” says Michael Baker, assistant professor of physics at UMass Amherst. “We show that if a primordial black hole is formed with a small dark electric charge, then the toy model predicts that it should be temporarily stabilized before finally exploding.”
This tweak dramatically changes the odds. Instead of one explosion every 100,000 years, the model suggests we could see one every 10 years.
“We’re not claiming that it’s absolutely going to happen this decade,” adds Baker, “but there could be a 90% chance that it does. Since we already have the technology to observe these explosions, we should be ready.”
Spotting a PBH explosion wouldn’t just confirm Hawking radiation, it would give us a complete particle catalog of the universe. That means everything we know (electrons, quarks, Higgs bosons), everything we suspect (dark matter), and everything we’ve never seen before.
“We know how to observe this Hawking radiation,” says Joaquim Iguaz Juan, postdoctoral researcher in physics at UMass Amherst. “We can see it with our current crop of telescopes, and because the only black holes that can explode today or in the near future are these PBHs, we know that if we see Hawking radiation, we are seeing an exploding PBH.”
“This would be the first-ever direct observation of both Hawking radiation and a PBH,” Iguaz Juan adds. “We would also get a definitive record of every particle that makes up everything in the universe. It would completely revolutionize physics and help us rewrite the history of the universe.”
As the universe quietly ticks toward its next big reveal, physicists are urging us to be ready. The tools are in place. The theory is sound. And the odds are better than ever.
Journal Reference:
- Michael J. Baker, Joaquim Iguaz Juan et al. Could We Observe an Exploding Black Hole in the Near Future? Physical Review Letters. DOI: 10.1103/nwgd-g3zl
