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What if SgrA* Is Not Actually a Supermassive Black Hole?

2026-02-17 Science & Technology
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Anton Petrov
Anton Petrov
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Support this channel on Patreon to help me make this a full time job: https://www.patreon.com/whatdamath (Unreleased videos, extra footage, DMs, no ads) Alternatively, PayPal donations can be sent here: http://paypal.me/whatdamath Get a Wonderful Person Tee: https://teespring.com/stores/whatdamath More cool designs are on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3QFIrFX Hello and welcome! My name is Anton and in this video, we will talk about a proposition that SgrA* could be something other than a massive black hole Links: https://academic.oup.com/mnras/article/546/1/staf1854/8431112?login=false https://ras.ac.uk/news-and-press/research-highlights/dark-matter-not-black-hole-could-power-milky-ways-heart https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.14686 Other videos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9N63yHgjECU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ES8pP83slXU #smbh #blackhole #milkyway 0:00 Center of the Milky Way galaxy 0:40 Study suggests it's not a black hole 1:10 What is SgrA*? Main mysteries 4:45 New model - it's dark matter? 6:50 Possible models and explanations 8:50 Summary of main points 9:45 How this could be proved 11:00 Implications for our galaxy 12:35 Conclusions Enjoy and please subscribe Bitcoin/Ethereum to spare? Donate them here to help this channel grow! bc1qnkl3nk0zt7w0xzrgur9pnkcduj7a3xxllcn7d4 or ETH: 0x60f088B10b03115405d313f964BeA93eF0Bd3DbF The hardware used to record these videos: New Camera: https://amzn.to/4pCVINS CPU: https://amzn.to/4qXIaxC Video Card: https://amzn.to/2M1W26C Motherboard: https://amzn.to/2JYGiQQ RAM: https://amzn.to/2Mwy2t4 PSU: https://amzn.to/2LZcrIH Case: https://amzn.to/2MwJZz4 Microphone: https://amzn.to/2t5jTv0 Mixer: https://amzn.to/2JOL0oF Recording and Editing: https://amzn.to/2LX6uvU Some of the above are affiliate links, meaning I would get a (very small) percentage of the price paid. Thank you to all Patreon supporters of this channel Special thanks also goes to all the wonderful supporters of the channel through YouTube Memberships Credit: Mark Garlick www.markgarlick.com ESO/GRAVITY collaboration/L. Calçada Valentina Crespi et al Siderevs nuncivs CC BY SA 4.0 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IC_443#/media/File:IC443_Final_with_copyright.jpg Licenses used: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ and relevant Creative Commons licenses

Top Comments (10)

@helmeteye 2026-02-17

If a clump of dark matter got dense enough, why wouldn't it collapsed into a black hole identical to other black holes?

766 260 replies
@jjptech 2026-02-17

We need something similar to "It's never aliens" but like "It is never Dark matter"

462 50 replies
@shex9 2026-02-17

I’m glad I’m not the only one having dark matter fatigue 😂.

238 12 replies
@theophrastus3.056 2026-02-18

It's probably creamy, stretchy caramel and fluffy chocolate-malt nougat. The Mars Candy company has never kept ingredients of the center of any Milky Way a secret.

136 3 replies
@Alondro77 2026-02-17

What would prevent dark matter from collapsing into a black hole? We don't even know what it is (assuming it even exists), so pretending we can predict its properties is silliness.

54 17 replies
@footinpianoheaduptuba 2026-02-18

Inside the milky way center: "They are scanning us again, what do we do?" "Uh just... Uh fly casually"

20 1 replies
@petepanteraman 2026-02-17

2:41 we're too close to the black hole and we experience time dilated effects from the black hole.

7
@AutisticThinker 2026-02-18

Even if there’s a very dense concentration of dark matter at the center of the Milky Way, that doesn’t automatically mean there isn’t a black hole there too. We already have extremely strong evidence that Sagittarius A* behaves like a supermassive black hole: stellar orbits show relativistic precession, we’ve measured gravitational redshift, and the Event Horizon Telescope image is consistent with an event horizon and photon orbit structure. Any alternative has to reproduce all of that, not just the mass. Dense dark matter clustering at the galactic center is totally plausible — simulations even predict dark matter “spikes” around black holes. But that scenario naturally leads to a hybrid model: a supermassive black hole at the core, surrounded by a dense dark matter concentration. The black hole dominates the spacetime geometry at small radii; the dark matter modifies the larger-scale mass distribution. So even if dark matter condenses strongly in galactic center, the simplest explanation that fits all observations is still that there’s a supermassive black hole there; possibly embedded in an unusually dense dark matter environment (not replaced by one).

7
@stoatystoat174 2026-02-18

We have a lot to learn

4
@roccochioda 2026-05-17

Man I love my daily Anton!! I think I actually learn things that are worth learning here. Thanks buddy

1

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