Astronomers have found strong evidence of a supermassive black hole inside the Large Magellanic Cloud, a small galaxy near the Milky Way. This discovery, based on the movement of hypervelocity stars, suggests that the galaxy has a hidden black hole at its core. Scientists have long suspected its presence, but this is the first direct proof.
Tracking the Black Hole’s Existence
The Large Magellanic Cloud, located 160,000 light-years from Earth, is one of the closest galaxies to the Milky Way. Researchers used data from the European Space Agency’s Gaia space observatory to track the movement of nine fast-moving stars at the edge of the Milky Way. Their trajectories suggest they were flung out of the Large Magellanic Cloud after interacting with a supermassive black hole.
The Power of Hypervelocity Stars
The black hole’s immense gravity tears the pair apart, capturing one star while slinging the other into space at incredible speeds.
Jesse Han, an astrophysics researcher at Harvard University, led the study. He explained that these ejected stars travel at thousands of kilometers per second, far exceeding the speed of ordinary stars like the sun, which moves at 720,000 km/h. The study, published in the Astrophysical Journal, confirms that nine known hypervelocity stars came from the Large Magellanic Cloud, proving that it must contain a supermassive black hole.
Read: Scientists Engineer Mice with Woolly Mammoth-Like Fur
How Massive Is This Black Hole?
The Milky Way’s black hole, Sgr A*, is 4 million times the mass of the sun. By comparison, the newly identified black hole in the Large Magellanic Cloud is much smaller, at 600,000 times the mass of the sun. While it is one of the least massive supermassive black holes ever detected, its existence aligns with predictions based on the galaxy’s structure and size.
A Major Discovery in Astronomy
Until now, the closest known supermassive black hole outside the Milky Way was inside the Andromeda Galaxy, located 2.5 million light-years away. The Large Magellanic Cloud’s black hole is much closer, making it a key target for further research.
Despite this breakthrough, scientists still need to pinpoint its exact location. Kareem El-Badry, an astronomer at Caltech and co-author of the study, emphasized that while this finding was based on indirect evidence, it makes logical sense. More research will help confirm its position and further unravel the mysteries of black holes in nearby galaxies.
Follow us on Google News, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook,Whats App, and TikTok for latest updates