BENGALURU: India’s first dedicated Space Astronomy Observatory AstroSat has enabled an international team of scientists to unravel the mysteries surrounding the X-ray binary system named MAXI J1820+070, which hosts a black hole, ISRO said on Tuesday.

X-ray binaries, so-called because they emit X-rays, are made up of a normal star and a collapsed star, which may be a white dwarf, neutron star, or a black hole. MAXI J1820+070 is a low-mass X-ray binary with a black hole as a compact object.

The study, which was accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal, “presents unique insights into the behaviour of this transient black hole X-ray binary during its 2018 outburst”, ISRO said.

The team was led by researchers from Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Pune, and includes researchers from India, the UK, Abu Dhabi, and Poland.