Neposredna prijetnja u egzoplanetima
Nova istraživanja ukazuju da gasoviti divovi u blizini središta Mliječnog puta mogu nakupiti velike količine tamne materije i da se u njihovim jezgrama iznenada može formirati crna rupa. Takav proces bi, kako navode autori, mogao „pojesti“ planet iznutra, pretvarajući ga u crnu rupu iste mase kao i planet koji je progutala. Ovaj scenarij odnosi se na gasovite planete, pa je Zemlja trenutno bezbjedna.
"In gaseous exoplanets of various sizes, temperatures, and densities, black holes could form on observable timescales, potentially even generating multiple black holes in a single exoplanet's lifetime,"
Model predlaže da tamna materija nije nužno one koja se međusobno anhilira, već da se superteške čestice mogu zarobiti u jezgri gasovitog planeta. Tamo rijetke interakcije s običnom materijom usporavaju čestice, one se sabijaju i mogu postati dovoljno guste da se uruše u crnu rupu, što ponekad može potrajati i samo nekoliko mjeseci.
"These results show how exoplanet surveys could be used to hunt for superheavy dark matter particles, especially in regions hypothesized to be rich in dark matter like our Milky Way's galactic center."
Sudbina takve crne rupe zavisi od njene početne mase: "Whether a black hole inside a planet survives or not depends on how massive it is when it first forms," i mogla bi se ugasiti prije nego što počne rasti. "Interestingly there is also a special in-between mass where these two effects balance each other out," "In that case, the black hole neither grows nor evaporates — it could remain stable inside the planet for a long time."
Takvi objekti bi bili teško detektabilni gravitaciono, ali bi mogli biti neobično topli. "Rather, our point is that if detailed studies reveal temperatures that cannot be explained by ordinary processes," "then dark matter could be considered as one possible — though still controversial — explanation."
Otkrivanje crne rupe mase planeta bi bilo veliki proboj: "Discovering a black hole with the mass of a planet would be a major breakthrough," "It would support the thesis of our paper and offer an alternative to the commonly accepted theory that planet-sized black holes could only form in the early universe," i moglo bi "offer strong evidence in favor of the superheavy non-annihilating dark matter model,". Za naš Sunčev sistem takav ishod je malo vjerovatan zbog udaljenosti od galaktičkog centra (~26.000 svjetlosnih godina).
