It is 13.2 billion years old.. Discovery of the oldest black hole in the universe

ArabiaWeather - Scientists have discovered what is believed to be the oldest black hole in the universe so far, which formed 470 million years after the Big Bang. The results, which were published on Monday, show what until recently were considered theories indicating the existence of massive black holes in the early The formation of the universe.

NASA 's James Webb Space Telescope and the Chandra X-ray Observatory participated in this study, according to the Associated Press.

Based on the study, the age of this black hole is about 13.2 billion years , while the age of the universe itself is about 13.7 billion years. What makes this discovery even more exciting is that this black hole is exceptionally huge, as its size is about 10 times greater than the size of the black hole. Located in our galaxy, the Milky Way.

It is believed that the weight of this black hole ranges between 10 and 100 percent of the total mass of all the stars in its galaxy. Scientists point out that this percentage seems far from the small percentage of black holes found in our galaxy, the Milky Way, and in other nearby galaxies, according to Priyamvada Natarajan from Yale University, who participated in the study published in the journal Nature Astronomy, said, “It is currently very difficult to say that the universe is the size of this massive black hole.

How did the massive black hole originate in the heart of space?

Researchers believe that the black hole was the result of a huge flow of gas from a neighboring galaxy colliding with it, and then the two galaxies merged and the black hole took over.

Confirmation of the existence of the black hole came thanks to the observations of the Chandra Observatory , which recorded the It has not been detected by X-rays yet, and researchers expect to discover more ancient black holes, perhaps not that far away, but this is still in the advanced stages.

The Webb and Chandra telescopes took advantage of gravitational lensing technology to expand the observation range of the UHZ1 galaxy and its black hole. They used light coming from a much closer group of galaxies, which are only about 3.2 billion light-years away from us, to greatly enlarge the image of the UHZ1 galaxy and its black hole in the background.

It is worth noting that the Webb telescope was launched in 2021, and it is the largest and most powerful astronomical observatory ever sent into space, and it is equipped with the ability to see the universe in infrared rays, while the Chandra telescope relies on X-rays and was launched into orbit in 1999, as researchers expressed They expressed their admiration for the ability of the Chandra telescope to make such remarkable discoveries 24 years after its launch.

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Sources:

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