Shanghai Astronomical Observatory Astrophysics Colloquium

Title：The Event Horizon Telescope journey from the Earth to the heart of the Milky Way

Speaker: Rocco Lico (IRA-INAF) SHAO）

Time：3:00 pm Apr.24th (Thursday)

Tencent Meeting：42915400486 password: 6360

Location: Lecture Hall, 3rd floor

Abstract：

The release of the first Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) image of Sagittarius A* marks the first direct visual evidence of a supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way. The image reveals a structure dominated by a bright, thick ring surrounding a central dark region — known as the black hole shadow — with a diameter of approximately 52 microarcseconds. Supported by an extensive suite of numerical simulations, the observed brightness distribution and morphology align with predictions for a ~4.3 million solar mass Kerr black hole viewed at a low inclination angle (<50°). In this talk, I will review the scientific and technical challenges involved in the analysis process, imaging techniques, and theoretical interpretation that led to this landmark achievement.

CV：

Rocco Lico is a staff scientist at the Institute of Radio Astronomy (IRA-INAF) in Italy. He earned his PhD in Astronomy from the University of Bologna in 2015. In the years that followed, he held postdoctoral positions at the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy (MPIfR) in Germany and the Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía (IAA-CSIC) in Spain. His research focuses primarily on the physics of supermassive black holes and their relativistic jets. He is an active member of the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) collaboration, where he holds several leadership roles. In 2022, he was awarded one of the EHT Early Career Awards in recognition of his contributions to the Sagittarius A* results. He is currently a PIFI visiting scientist at the Shanghai Astronomical Observatory (SHAO).

Koushare link to the recorded presentation