Record-Breaking Black Hole Discovered By Astronomers
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MIAMI (CBSMiami) -- One of the most massive black holes ever seen has been discovered by astronomers, NASA has announced.
Located about 300 million light-years away in the Coma Cluster, a record-breaking supermassive black hole was photographed by the Hubble Space Telescope in the NGC 4889 galaxy.
"Twenty-one billion times the mass of the sun, this black hole has an event horizon — the surface at which even light cannot escape its gravitational grasp — with a diameter of approximately 130 billion kilometres," NASA said in a released statement.
At our galaxy's center, the Milky Way, there exists a supermassive black hole, as well. By comparison, our black hole is believed to have a mass of only four million times that of the sun.
Astronomers believe that the NGC 4889 black hole has stopped feeding and is in a period of rest after feasting on the NGC 4889 cosmos.
Although impossible to actually see a black hole, since light doesn't escape its gravitational pull, scientists are able to calculate its mass by measuring the stars surround it.
