Astronomers have discovered the most massive stellar cluster Black hole It has been discovered in our galaxy – and is lurking “very close” to Earth, according to new research.
The black hole, called Gaia BH3, is 33 times more massive than our Sun. Cygnus X-1, the second-largest known stellar black hole in our galaxy, weighs just 21 solar masses. The newly discovered black hole is located approximately 2,000 light-years away in the constellation Eagle, making it the second closest known black hole to Earth.
The researchers published their findings April 16 in the journal Astronomy and astrophysics.
“No one would have expected to find a high-mass black hole lurking nearby, and it has not yet been discovered,” Gaia collaboration member Pasquale PanozzoAstronomer at the Paris Observatory, affiliated with the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS), He said in a statement. “This is the kind of discovery you make once in your research life.”
Related: The James Webb Space Telescope has discovered the oldest black hole in the universe, a cosmic monster 10 million times heavier than the sun.
Black holes arise from the collapse of giant stars and grow by devouring gas, dust, stars and other black holes. Currently, known black holes fall into two categories: stellar-mass black holes, whose masses range from a few to a few tens of times the mass of the Sun; And supermassive black holes, cosmic monsters that can be a few million to 50 billion times more massive than the sun.
Intermediate-mass black holes — theoretically 100 to 100,000 times the mass of the Sun — are the most elusive black holes in the universe. While there have been many promising candidates, the existence of intermediate-mass black holes has not been conclusively confirmed. By finding emerging black holes and studying how they evolve, as well as their impact on the surrounding environment, scientists hope they can fill this cosmic void.
To observe the nearby black hole, researchers used the European Space Agency's Gaia spacecraft, which maps the positions and movements of the Milky Way's approximately 2 billion stars. Digging through Gaia data, astronomers found one star that appears to have a pronounced wobble — a slight jitter in the normally smooth path of its path. The researchers concluded that the only possible cause is the pull of an unseen companion black hole.
Astronomers followed up Gaia's observations with more data from the Very Large Telescope in Chile's Atacama Desert, and confirmed the existence of the black hole. The observations also helped them find an accurate measurement of its mass. At 2,000 light-years from Earth, only Gaia BH1, a black hole 1,500 light-years away, is closer to us.
The researchers say they want to study it further to gain insight into how it forms and how it might affect the matter surrounding it. Preliminary results reveal that the star it orbits is “metal poor,” or lacks elements heavier than hydrogen and helium, adding credence to the theory that mini black holes could form from stars that have combined less of their nuclear fuel into heavier elements.
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