Mumbai-Born Astrophysicist Discovers Black Hole 142 Times Heavier Than Our Sun
Researchers feel that GW190521 was generated by a source which would have existed when our universe was nearly half of the age it¡¯s currently at. This also makes it one of the most distant gravitational wave sources ever detected.
Researchers have discovered a black hole that¡¯s not only the oldest ever detected but also doesn¡¯t qualify to exist, as per current understanding of the black holes. The gargantuan black hole is 142 times the mass of our Sun.
LIGO/Caltech/MIT/R.Hunt
Around 1,500 researchers who are a part of this discovery, belong to two consortiums -- The LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory) consortium and Europe¡¯s Virgo collaboration have contributed to this discovery.
They discovered this gargantuan black hole with the help of LIGO and Virgo gravitational wave detectors that spotted the gravitational wave possessing eight times the energy of the Sun, coming from roughly 17 billion light-years away. The discovery was made on May 21 and was labelled GW190521.
Researchers feel that GW190521 was generated by a source which would have existed when our universe was nearly half of the age it¡¯s currently at. This also makes it one of the most distant gravitational wave sources ever detected.
Normally black holes are formed when a dying star collapses. They¡¯re normally three to ten times the solar masses. Theories have stated that black holes with mass ranging from 100 to 1000 times that of our Sun exist, but were never found, until this discovery.
LIGO/Caltech/MIT/R.Hunt
According to researchers, this massive black hole is formed after the fusion of a black hole with 66 times the size of the Sun with another black hole with 85 percent the mass of the Sun. They claim that when these massive black holes fused together, they released energy worth eight solar masses that created the most powerful events in the universe sine the Big Bang.
They still don¡¯t know how these two even came together, but they feel that each of those black holes comprised of smaller black holes -- just like Russian dolls, according to OzGrav postdoctoral researcher Simon Stevenson, from Swinburne University of Technology.
Karan Jani, an Indian-origin astrophysicist one of the several researchers with the Nobel-winning LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory) consortium (led by MIT and Caltech scientists) gravitational wave experiment states, "This detection confirms that there is a vast universe that has remained invisible to us. We have very limited theoretical and observational understanding of this elusive class of intermediate black hole."
Representational Image: NASA
He added, "Our ability to find a black hole a few hundred kilometres-wide from half-way across the Universe is one of the most striking realisations of this discovery.¡±
