Certainly a monster among black holes. Thanks to the ASKAP ( Australian Square Kilometer Array Pathfinder ) radio telescope under test, a team of astronomers from the CSIRO Center for Astronomy and Space Sciences has discovered a supermassive black hole with an impressive size: it has a mass of 3,000 million times that of our own. Sun, a figure that is out of all cosmic standards.
The discovery of this huge black hole (it is 750 times bigger than the one in the center of the Milky Way) has been possible thanks to the observation of three galaxies in the process of merging that are 1.8 billion light years away. distance.
The results were confirmed by the Australian Compact Telescope Array at Narrabri, which found that the gas that forms the maser (the astrophysical maser phenomenon is similar to conventional laser, but is microwave-based) was moving at about 600 kilometers per second. . By knowing the speed of the gas, the experts were able to directly measure the mass of the black hole that was causing this gas to swirl.
ASKAP, which currently has 9 antennas and whose construction is still underway (completion is scheduled for 2018), will become a large radio telescope of 36 identical antennas with 12 meters in diameter each and that will work simultaneously as if from a only instrument will be involved.
