For the first time, scientists have identified a rogue black hole wandering through the galaxy that contains Earth.
According to Science Alert, the object was discovered from a mysterious astronomical event called MOA-11-191/OGLE-11-0462, detected by two separate surveys known as the Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment (OGLE) and the Microlensing Observations in Astrophysics (MOA).
It has just been confirmed as a black hole, currently drifting in space approximately 5,200 light-years away from Earth.
The MOA-11-191/OGLE-11-0462 event through 8 observations by Hubble – (Photo: Hubble/NASA/ESA).
An international study led by Dr. Kailash Sahu from the Space Telescope Science Institute indicated that this is the first time a wandering black hole has been captured, although calculations suggest there are about 10 million to 1 billion of such black holes, each with a mass equivalent to that of a giant star, drifting throughout the Milky Way galaxy.
However, we cannot see them, as black holes are completely dark. MOA-11-191/OGLE-11-0462 was discovered indirectly through the distortions it creates everywhere.
The gravitational field of this black hole bends the space-time around it, causing any light passing through to be warped and twisted. When observing certain stars, scientists noticed the invisible entity magnifying and bending the starlight: it was the black hole they were searching for.
Previously, the black hole was only known to two surveys as an unidentified object moving through the Milky Way at a speed of 45 km/s, indicated by the starlight magnification event MOA-11-191/OGLE-11-0462 that occurred from June 2 and peaked on July 20, 2011, lasting for 270 days with an unusually high intensity.
By comparing different possibilities and data from 8 observations by the Hubble Space Telescope, they found that only a black hole matched all the indicators.
This wandering black hole weighs about 7.1 times the mass of the Sun and has a diameter of approximately 42 km.
