Black hole discovered 40 billion times larger than the Sun
The black hole Holm 15A* is hundreds of millions of light-years from Earth and is so large that the solar system could fit within its event horizon.
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Holm 15A* is one of the largest black holes in the universe. Photo: France24. |
The black hole lies at the center of Holmberg 15A, a giant elliptical galaxy 700 million light-years away in the heart of the Abell 85 galaxy cluster. It is one of the largest black holes ever discovered. The results of the study were published in the journal arXiv on July 24.
Previous calculations based on the motion of galaxies and galaxy clusters estimated the mass of Holm 15A* to be 310 billion times that of the Sun. However, that was an indirect calculation. By tracking the motion of stars around the black hole, the team found a more accurate figure.
Holm 15A* is not the most massive black hole. The record belongs to the black hole in the quasar TON 618, which is 66 billion times more massive than the Sun. But the event horizon, or Schwarzschild radius, of Holm 15A* is 790 AU (astronomical units, defined as the distance from Earth to the Sun), enough to encompass the orbits of every planet in the Solar System. By comparison, Pluto is only 39.5 AU from the Sun.
