Thomas Jichen Wang | ISEF 2025 Second Place Grand Award in Physics & Astronomy

As a lifelong sci-fi fan, I wasn’t satisfied with just watching Interstellar; I wanted a glimpse of the universe’s secret - observing black holes from telescopes instead of TVs. No light has ever escaped black holes; however, they are among the brightest objects in the sky because of a disk of hot gas trapped by their gravity. When black holes and their disks change brightness (or "blink”), I take frequent pictures using a 24-inch telescope at the Allegheny Observatory. By finding a time difference between the arrival of different colored lights, I can infer the time it takes for light to travel across the disk, effectively estimating the radius of black holes’ disks.