if the moon were collapsed to a black hole, would the orbit change?

Question

in a idea for science fiction... a giant particle accelerator/collider is built around the circumference of the moon....the resulting experiments eventually create a small , but stable black hole that immediately swallows the entire mass of the moon....conserving the exact mass of the moon, and its angular momentum... what would happen? would the moon (black hole) collide with earth? depart from the earth? or discharge a burst of energy in the form of hawking radiation, and dissapate? some brilliant mind can surmise this, im sure.. can you? because i cant imagine what would occur

Answer 1

no?! if the mass stays the same then you must assume that its still under the gravitational influence of the earths mass, because it is mass that causes gravity, unless the very center of the moons orbit changes because the tidal/gravitational pull is strongest on the surface which is why the moon causes high tides on earth and if the moon had oceans then the tide would be so high they just might be pulled right off and fall down on earth! so if the moon were to collapse then the distance of its surface would move about half of the moons diameter . but that distance is not much when you compare it to its orbit so it should still be going around the earth! oh and by the way if it were to collapse then its event horizon [ the point of no return] would be about the size of a hydrogen atom if not smaller! and if you want to learn more about black holes then look up Stephen Hawkins he knows more about them than anyone else [ and he says that there might be black holes smaller than an atom that were created at the beginning of the big bang when the entire universe was the size of an atom!]

Answer 2

okay, first of all, what you propose is not even remotely possible. the moon simply doesn't have the mass. HOWEVER, your question could better be phrased in this manner: "Assume the circumference of the moon were to be shrunk until the moon was essentially a point mass. Would the behavior of the earth moon system change?"

The answer is no. Since for calculation purposes, masses can be considered to be located at the center of mass (on a sphere the point at the very center) the behavior is all calculated as though both the moon and the earth are already point masses. So if the moon were to shrink to the size of a point mass but keep constant all it's other factors (vector, mass, etc) then it would not change behaviors at all.

Answer 3

I would think that the orbit would become more and more irregular. I would think that as the matter around it would be consumed it would alter its mass. Once the mass is altered, it is pretty easy to believe that its orbit will change. Also, the moon and the earth are reliant on eachother's orbits. The moon and earth kind of wobble through space, keeping themselves roughly 93 million miles away from the sun. If the moon were to suddenly go black hole it would alter this and the earth could very likely be thrown out of its present orbit. Not to mention the fact that our tides would change considerably. In essence, we would be pretty screwed if the moon went black hole because a lot of environmental factors would be affected.

Answer 4

The surface of a Black Hole, or Event, is formed from matter that has been broken down to its basic subatomic state at just above Relative Zero Degrease Kelvin. Relative, because it is still rotating with the spin of the main body. The color and texture of this surface/event would be that of a Black 20lb Rag Bond sheet of paper. Photons do not reflect off this kind of surface and are absorbed. Gravity has no influence on Photons. Some will say that Gravity wells bend light, when all that is happening is that the Gravity is influencing the physical space around it to cause a refraction, not the actual Gravity well itself.

Answer 5

It will depart from it's orbit of the Earth because it will swallow the Earth into the unknown. It will no longer orbit the earth because a black hole can not only swallow a planet, but also other things in the solar system such as asteroids, other planets, other satellites, & man made satellites. I hope that don't happen.

Answer 6

Every year the moon gets farther away from the Earth. Eventually the Earth will loose it’s gravitation on it and the moon will no longer orbit the Earth.

Answer 7

I realize that you are taking in terms of science fiction but what you are proposing is completely impossible. Black holes are created from the collapse of massive stars. The moon would never be able to create one nor could one be created around it. Also, black holes do not orbit anything. Super massive black holes are usually at the center of spiral galaxies.

Answer 8

the moon pulls on the earth and it gravational forse creates the tide with no tides the waters would be still and with no movement the seas would die from lack of oxeygen in the water and soon thereafter life as we know it