VISUAL ARCHIVE / IMAGE STORY
One Star Bound, One Star Gone
The Hills mechanism offers a possible origin for a captured S301.
In the proposed Hills encounter, one star escaped while S301 remained bound to Sagittarius A. The former companion has not been identified. AI-generated conceptual illustration; the separation is imagined and is not shown to scale.*
THE OBSERVATION
What we can actually see.
A massive black hole can disrupt a binary so that one member becomes tightly bound and another escapes. S301’s high eccentricity is compatible with this mechanism, but compatibility does not establish that this exact event took place.
THE ILLUSTRATION
What the artwork imagines.
The diverging trajectories are a dramatization of a calculation. No camera recorded the breakup or the departing companion, and the illustration is not drawn to scale.
FROM THE ILLUSTRATED ARTICLE
The story that inspired it.
The article follows S301’s observed orbit and the future prospect of measuring Sagittarius A* spin from repeated passages. The Hills mechanism offers a possible origin for a captured S301.
Read The Star Our Black Hole KeptCHECK THE RECORD
The image interprets the research below. Follow the original work for the measurements and limits behind the scene.
S301 orbit discovery in NatureOTHER IMAGE STORIES
S301 at the Edge of Strong Gravity
The Companion We Have Not Found
The Mark Shared by Titan and Pluto