New research done by Australian National University has shown that the fastest growing black hole in the Universe is the most massive as well as eats much. It is 34 billion times the mass of our sun and gobbles up nearly the equivalent of one Sun every day, according to Dr. Christopher Onken and his colleagues.
The giant black hole known as J2157 has a mass 8000 times bigger that the black hole in the centre of Milky Way. If Milky Way swallows two-third of stars in our galaxy then only it can become as big as J2157. J2157 was discovered in 2018 by the same team.
‘We are seeing it at a time when the Universe was only 1.2 billion years old. It is the biggest black hole that has been weighed. We knew we were into a very massive black hole when we realized its fast growth rate. How much black holes can swallow depends on how much mass they already have. So, for this one to be devouring matter at such a high rate, we thought it could become a new world record,” Dr. Fuyan Bian said.
The team including researchers from the University of Arizona used ESO’s very large telescope in Chile to accurately measure the black hole’s mass.
Dr. Onken said, “With such an enormous black hole, we are also excited to see what we can learn about the galaxy in which it is growing. We will have to keep digging.”
Source: ANI