Astronomers have achieved a historic breakthrough.
They have directly observed spacetime being bent.
The phenomenon was seen near a rotating black hole.
It confirms a key prediction of Einstein’s theory.
The observation occurred during a violent cosmic event.
A distant star was torn apart by a supermassive black hole.
As the star was destroyed, intense radiation was released.
Bursts of X-ray and radio light were detected.
Scientists tracked the remains of the star.
They noticed a repeating wobble in the debris.
As a result, a rare relativistic effect was revealed.
Spacetime itself was being dragged by the black hole’s spin.
This effect is known as frame-dragging.
It was predicted by Albert Einstein more than a century ago.
The findings were published in Science Advances.
The study focused on a tidal disruption event called AT2020afhd.
The research was led by the National Astronomical Observatories of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Scientists from Cardiff University also played a key role.
During the event, stellar material formed a rotating disk.
At the same time, powerful jets were launched.
These jets showed synchronized motion.
This behavior pointed directly to spacetime dragging.
The phenomenon is also called Lense–Thirring precession.
It occurs when a spinning black hole twists spacetime around it.
Einstein first proposed the idea in 1913.
He formally described it in 1918.
Until now, direct evidence was missing.
This observation fills that gap.
The team combined multiple datasets.
They used X-ray data from Swift.
They also analyzed radio signals from the Very Large Array.
Together, the data confirmed the effect.
The discovery opens a new window into black hole physics.
It reveals how black holes spin.
It also explains how they pull in matter.
Jet formation near light speed is now better understood.
Overall, the finding marks a major step forward.
It deepens our understanding of the most extreme objects in the universe.
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