Rotating black holes are packed with energy—here's how to unlock it

Rotating black holes are the most powerful phenomenon in the known universe. Their powerful gravity radically alters the curvature of spacetime around them, leading to relativistic effects like time dilation, light distortion, and for matter and photons to infall around them, forming accretion disks. In the case of supermassive black holes (SMBHs) at the center of galaxies, these disks are accelerated to close to the speed of light and emit powerful radiation that temporarily outshines all the stars in the disks.