The Fastest Growing Monster Black Hole Is Devouring A Sun's Mass In A Day
The J2157 black hole powers a quasar - an active galactic nucleus that is extremely luminous and contains a massive black hole - in the centre of a galaxy billions of light-years away in the early universe. The black hole has grown at an exponential rate since its discovery in 2018. If the Milky Way black hole wanted to grow that fat it would have to swallow two thirds of all the stars in our galaxy.
Scientists have managed to measure the appetite of one of the largest known black holes in the Universe. If the new measurements are to be believed, the particular black hole is the fastest growing black hole we know of in the entire Universe, devouring mass equivalent to that of a Sun every day.
The ultra-massive black hole is termed as SMSS?J215728.21¨C360215.1 or simply J2157. The recent study points that the J2157 has grown at an exponential rate since its discovery in 2018.
What is J2157?
The J2157 black hole powers a quasar - an active galactic nucleus that is extremely luminous and contains a massive black hole - in the centre of a galaxy billions of light-years away in the early universe.
Located around 12.5 billion light-years from Earth, the ultramassive black hole is extremely luminous given its gigantic mass.
As quoted in a sci-news report, if the J2157 black hole was to be at the center of our Milky Way Galaxy, ¡°it would appear 10 times brighter than a full moon.¡±
What does the study suggest?
(Representative Image: Reuters)
Published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, the study points out the ¡°black hole (BH) mass of the quasar J215 as being (3.4 ¡À 0.6) ¡Á 1010?M¡Ñ(black hole mass)¡± and its redshift to be ¡°z = 4.692.¡±
These measurements hint at a much bigger size and accretion rate of the J2157. The study highlights it to be ¡°one of the most massive BHs at z > 4.¡±
As a Science Alert report points out, the J2157 was estimated to ¡°devour around half a solar mass a day,¡± at the time of its discovery, with a recorded mass of around 20 billion solar masses. Now the revised numbers suggest its mass to be around 34 billion solar masses and an appetite of one sun¡¯s mass a day.
"The black hole's mass is also about 8,000 times bigger than the black hole in the centre of the Milky Way," the report quotes astronomer Christopher Onken of Australian National University in Australia. "If the Milky Way's black hole wanted to grow that fat, it would have to swallow two thirds of all the stars in our galaxy.¡±
