Giant galactic core formed after black hole battle

THE largest galactic core ever seen may be the remnant of a battle for black hole supremacy.

Omar Lopez-Cruz of Mexico’s National Institute of Astrophysics, Optics and Electronics and his team measured the core of galaxy Holm 15A, 650 million light years from Earth. They found it was a record-breaking 15,000 light years across – about one-sixth the diameter of the entire Milky Way.

The core’s size suggests the black hole it hosts could weigh 100 billion times the mass of our sun – nearly as much as the Milky Way (Astrophysical Journal Letters, doi.org/wtc). If so, it probably formed as two or three separate black holes jostled for position before merging into one, puffing up Holm 15A’s core in the process.

This article appeared in print under the headline “Giant galactic core in black hole battle”