Entering the Era of Black Hole Cinema with the Next Generation Event Horizon Telescope

Using a network of eight radio telescopes at six geographic locations spanning the Earth, the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) produced the first images of supermassive black holes in 2019 and 2022, launching the field of direct horizon-scale study of the spacetime and environments around black holes via direct imaging. The next-generation Event Horizon Telescope (ngEHT) is a project to double the number of telescopes in the current EHT and quadruple the recorded bandwidth. The resulting global interferometric array will have the capability to make detailed high-dynamic range millimeter and sub-millimeter polarimetric movies of M87, SgrA*, and other black hole targets – tracing the dynamical processes underlying black hole accretion and jet launching while zeroing in on stationary horizon-scale features that reveal the imprint of general relativity. I will provide an introduction to the ngEHT concept and array design, and highlight some of the scientific goals of the project.