What happens when a star gets too close to a black hole?

New simulations explain how tidally destroyed stars reveal hidden supermassive black holes.

Supermassive black holes are among the most enigmatic objects in the universe. They typically weigh millions or even billions of times the mass of the Sun and sit at the centers of most large galaxies.

At the heart of the Milky Way lies Sagittarius A*, our galaxy’s supermassive black hole, with a mass of about four mill...