Shanghai scientists led an international team to take high-resolution "radio photos"
In the center of the Milky Way where we live, there is a "super black hole" invisible to the naked eye: the diameter is equivalent to that of the earth, but the mass is at least 400,000 times that of the sun. It "devours" everything around it, and even light can't escape. Using the world's most advanced ground-based telescope array, the international team led by Shanghai scientists successfully took the closest "radio photo" to the black hole so far.
Today's British magazine Nature published this great achievement and specially distributed comments. Researcher Shen Zhiqiang of Shanghai Observatory of Chinese Academy of Sciences, who is in charge of this work, said that this is the most convincing evidence to confirm the existence of this "super black hole" in the center of the Milky Way under the existing observation conditions. This black hole is located in the direction of Sagittarius, about 26,000 light years away from the Earth.
It is reported that as early as 1930s, astronomers predicted the existence of black holes in theory, but since they don't emit light, how to identify black holes from observations has become one of the most challenging topics in modern astrophysics. In recent years, many "candidate black holes" have been selected by large space and ground telescopes, including Hubble, among which Sagittarius, the nearest target in the Milky Way, is a hot spot for astronomers all over the world.
Since 1997, the international team led by Shen Zhiqiang has made a lot of observations with the 10 radio telescope array located in the northern hemisphere, and constantly used new methods to improve the observation accuracy. In five years, the "line of sight" of radio waves approached the black hole step by step, and finally the world's first high-resolution image with a wavelength of 3.5 mm was obtained.
"This is the first time humans have seen an area so close to the center of a black hole, which is really exciting," Shen Zhiqiang said. Through observation, scientists found that this "super black hole" is not only extremely massive, but also surprisingly dense, which is more than 65.438 billion times larger than the existing "candidate black hole".
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Willing to Be a Compass for Ships —— Interview with Xiao Huwei, Director of Information Consulting Department of Shanghai Institute of Science and Technology Information
The reason why Tian Ji won the King of Qi in horse racing is that he attached importance to the role of information besides using the overall planning method. If you don't know the strength comparison of the other third-class horses in advance, the overall planning method will be impossible. Xiao Huwei, director of the information consulting department of Shanghai Institute of Science and Technology Information, explained the importance of information through such a simple example.
"Independent innovation, information first", the national independent innovation strategy pushes enterprises to the dominant position of independent innovation in the market, and at the same time blows the horn of scientific and technological information work.
Xiao Huwei said that intelligence is equivalent to people's eyes and ears, and is equivalent to a ship's compass. Introduction is not a necessary condition for digesting and absorbing innovation, but information is a necessary condition for introducing equipment and technology. In view of this, Shanghai Institute of Science and Technology Information clearly regards "information collection, sorting, activation, development, dissemination and utilization" as its development concept, and actively takes measures to ensure the implementation of this concept.
1995, Information Institute merged with Shanghai Library, becoming the first and only provincial library and information consortium in China, effectively realizing "resource sharing, complementary advantages and chain service".
In the past, due to people's lack of sufficient attention to information work, a lot of resources were duplicated and wasted. According to statistics, the repetition rate of scientific research projects in China is 40%, while the other 60% have more than 20%.
Xiao Huwei believes that from the perspective of economics, research is expensive, results are expensive, and information is cheap. If the research cost of a scientific and technological achievement is 1, the development and promotion cost is 10, the production cost is as high as 100, and the information cost is only 0.5. Among the top 500 American companies in the world, 35% of their operating profits are created by intelligence work. According to the statistics of the World Intellectual Property Organization, making full use of patent information can shorten the research cycle by 60% and save research funds by 40%. Academician Wu, winner of the highest national science and technology award in 2005, entrusted Shanghai Institute of Information to carry out citation retrieval service for hundreds of papers every year, which is a typical example.
Intelligence agencies should first do their own intelligence work in this field, and Xiao Huwei is very concerned about the development trends of international and domestic counterparts. After attending the first Sino-Japanese scientific and technological information exchange meeting in 2005, he wrote articles such as "Intelligence Winning: A Magic Weapon for Japan's Development" and "Research on the Development Trend of Japanese Databases and Its Reference". He believed that China should speed up the development and utilization of information, continuously strengthen the construction of public welfare databases and encourage the establishment of "failed" databases. He also personally led a delegation to Guangdong, Shenzhen and other information institutes for investigation, and thought that Shanghai Information Institute should further emancipate its mind, expand the scope of external services, plan the construction of information industry from a macro perspective, and strengthen the construction of information industry cadres.
The development of Internet has brought great changes to the storage, manufacture and dissemination of information, and also brought new challenges to the development of information industry. In the face of "a lot of information, little use; Internet technical information with a lot of data and little credibility, how to effectively use massive information and eliminate false information has become another kind of confusion and demand after "hungry for information when information is poor", which highlights the necessity and importance of scientific and technological information work.
Shanghai Institute of Information should provide users with useful information sources through creation, refining and collection, and teach users information retrieval and analysis skills through training, guidance and demonstration. Establishing an information platform, following the principles of "eyes outward", "honest expression" and "information concentration", under the premise of "content is king", the concept of "online is a window, offline is a service" is clearly defined, and with the support of industry and intelligence, the content construction of advanced manufacturing, life science and resource environment three industry (discipline) is emphasized, which has achieved good results.
For intelligence work, publicity is the foundation, and non-publicity is a special case. For a long time, Shanghai Institute of Science and Technology Information has attached great importance to the popularization of information, especially Xiao Huwei. He not only taught in Peking University, Shanghai University, Shanghai University of Engineering Science and Shanghai Institute of Light Industry, but also held special lectures in large enterprises such as shanghai jahwa Group, Shanghai Huayi Group and Coking Group, providing three-dimensional training covering literature retrieval, patent strategy, competitive intelligence, technology foresight and market research.
He also posted some of his research results on his personal website in the form of word, and others are welcome to reprint them. His book "Entering the Frontier Technology" is the first time in China to investigate the development trend of new technologies such as e-books and virtual reality world from a unique research perspective. As soon as it was published, it was snapped up and was nominated as the 20 favorite books for readers in 2002. The 30 favorite books of East China Normal University students ranked fifth.
Xiao Huwei believes that information work and database construction should not always appear in the form of projects. A project will always end, but the information work and database construction will never end, and it needs constant supplement and development. In this regard, Xiao Huwei and his employees have a clear understanding, "be the eyes, ears and compass of the public, enterprises, institutions and decision-making organs." They are ready for the continuous struggle of intelligence work.