MSSL Astrophysics Group Beginner's Guides
Accretion Disc
Starting from the cooler, outer edges of the accretion
disc, you fly up and in towards the centre, where you can see the `monster'
lurking at the heart of every quasar - a supermassive black hole with the mass
of approximately 100 million Suns. The gas which forms the accretion disc
eventually spirals down until it becomes part of the black hole itself - and
releasing up to half of its rest-mass energy in doing so. This is the most
efficient form of energy generation known in the Universe.
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