Smaller-Scale Black Holes Might have Created Tunnels within Earth's Rock Structure
Innovative astrophysicists bring exciting news for everyone: If a primordial black hole perforates your body, chances are, you'll survive unscathed.
This reassuring announcement is part of their broader concept on potential locations where scientists might discover primordial black holes (PBMs): ancient, miniature, ultra-dense, theoretical black holes. In a study published in the December edition of Physics of the Dark Universe and accessible online since September, these astrophysicists propose that traces of PBMs might be hidden within void celestial bodies and terrestrial objects as well.
“We must think beyond the usual to find primordial black holes because the methods used before haven’t yielded results,” Robert Johnson from the University of Buffalo, collaborator of the study, stated in a university statement.
“Conventional” black holes, for lack of a better term, typically form following a dying star's collapse. Primordial black holes, however, might easily have materialized shortly after the Big Bang, during the epoch when compact regions of space also collapsed under their own gravity, before the advent of stars—hence the primordial designation.
Astrophysicists have theorized the existence of PBMs for decades, but no proof has ever been found. In line with the study, some scholars even believe that PBMs may constitute dark matter itself—the mysterious substance that makes up 85% of the universe's mass. “Small primordial black holes (PBMs) are perhaps the most intriguing and fascinating relics from the early universe,” the researchers wrote in the study.
Johnson and his colleague concluded that if a superfast PBM with a mass of 2.2 x 10^19 pounds (that's 22 followed by 18 zeros) pierces a solid object, it would leave behind a 0.1 micron-thick channel. Although it may appear small, this channel could be detectable using powerful microscopes, enabling us to investigate objects in our surroundings for signs of their existence.
Older objects are more likely to carry PBM channels, the astrophysicists contend. The likelihood of this event occurring in a one-billion-year-old boulder is 0.000001%, but not zero.
“The likelihood of discovering these signatures is small, but the potential reward, the first empirical evidence of a primordial black hole, is enormous,” Johnson stated in the statement.
This brings us back to the odds of a PBM burrowing through your body, which are even more negligible than one passing through a billion-year-old boulder. Even if it did occur, however, the researchers are confident that you would not experience severe injury, as human tissue has low tensile strength, allowing the PBM to transport through without tearing.
“If an object is moving faster than the speed of sound, the object's molecular structure has no time to react,” Johnson said. “If you throw a rock through a window, it is likely to shatter. If you shoot a window with a gun, it is likely to only leave a hole.” The PBM’s speed would also prevent it from releasing a significant amount of kinetic energy within your body.
Johnson and his collaborator, Hong Li from the University of California, Berkeley, also propose seeking evidence for PBMs in celestial bodies with remarkably low masses. They suspect that if a PBM traveled through a celestial body such as a planet, moon, or asteroid with a liquid core, it might get trapped inside, consuming its center, and hollowing it out until an external impact dislodged it.
“If the object contains a liquid central core, then a captured PBM can absorb the liquid core, whose density is higher than the outer solid layer’s,” Johnson explains. On the other hand, celestial bodies lacking a liquid core would bear microtunnels similar to those found in solid objects on Earth.
Consequently, the duo suggests that astronomers focus their search on celestial bodies with mass densities significantly lower than expected. These celestial bodies should also be smaller than one tenth of Earth's radius, as anything larger would collapse inward upon itself.
Though these parameters are, as Johnson asserts, “unconventional,” the researchers emphasize the importance of theoretical studies. “The brightest minds on the planet have yet to resolve these problems for 80 years,” he said. “We don't need just an extension of the existing models. We probably require a new framework altogether.”
Although the average person will not participate in the new search for primordial black holes, this notification serves as a reminder to alert the scientific community if something inexplicable pierces your body.
The astrophysicists' study suggests that future technological advancements in microscopy could potentially reveal traces of primordial black holes in various objects, including terrestrial ones. Moreover, they propose that celestial bodies with unconventional mass densities, smaller than one tenth of Earth's radius, could hide captive primordial black holes.
