Edinburgh and beyond: First-ever 3D movies of black holes to be created in capital using AI

The first images of black holes released by a multi-million pound research project at Heriot-Watt University. The first-ever 3D movies of black holes will be created by the programme, with hopes the techniques developed will also help speed up MRI scans for some patients. PIC: EHT Collaboration via Heriot-Watt University/PA Wire | EHT Collaboration via Heriot-Watt University/PA Wire

A multimillion-pound research project will see some of the world’s leading experts use artificial intelligence (AI) to create the first-ever 3D movies of black holes in Edinburgh.

Kazunori Akiyama is joining Heriot-Watt University for the TomoGrav project, which is being funded through a £4 million fellowship.

He was previously involved in creating the first images of black holes, stellar bodies which are so dense nothing – including light – can escape.

The team will create 3D movies showing how plasma flows around black holes, demonstrating how time and space is bent by their extreme gravity.

Meanwhile, it is hoped the AI techniques being developed under the programme will also speed up MRI scans for heart and liver patients and improve climate monitoring systems.

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Dr Akiyama, who is joining Heriot-Watt from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said: “The first images of black holes were extraordinary steps forward, but they were only fragments of what these astronomical objects are doing.

“Our collaboration brings together two expert communities, black hole astronomy and artificial intelligence, and it is at this interface that pathbreaking progress can now be made.

“By combining world-leading telescope capabilities with Heriot-Watt’s strengths in computational imaging, we will be able to follow the dynamics around black holes in a way that has never been possible before.

“Instead of a single blurred frame, we will see how plasma moves, how magnetic fields evolve, and how gravity shapes everything around the event horizon.

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“That shift, from still images to time-resolved structure, will fundamentally change the scientific questions we can ask and change our understanding of the universe.”

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Dr Akiyama will be joined by Professor Yves Wiaux, who is an expert in using artificial intelligence to create images using incomplete data.

He said: “Dr Akiyama and colleagues bring world-leading expertise in the telescopes and observations that will bring exquisite black hole data, while our methods in AI and computational imaging provide the tools needed to interpret that data.

“Our collaboration built on complementary strengths positions both Heriot-Watt and the UK to contribute meaningfully to a field that is now taking shape worldwide.”

Funding for the TomoGrav project comes from the Faraday Discovery Fellowships Accelerated International Route from the Royal Society.