An international network of gravitational wave observatories has recently detected the merger of two exceptionally massive black holes.
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Gravitational Wave Detection Network
Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory-LIGO: Supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF), world's largest gravitational wave observatory.
Currently, has two detectors in Hanford, Washington and Livingston Louisiana.
LIGO-India is to be developed in Hingoli, Maharashtra by the Department of Atomic Energy and the Department of Science and Technology, with the U.S. NSF and several national and international research institutions.
Virgo, in Pisa, Italy: Hosted by European Gravitational Observatory (EGO), a collaboration of Italy and France.
KAGRA, Japan: Located inside the Kamioka mine.
Two black holes, one of them 140 times more massive than the Sun, and the other 100 times bigger, merged to result a black hole estimated to be about 225 times the size of the Sun.
This event actually occurred billions of years ago.
This is the biggest black hole merger ever observed.
The detection of the gravitational waves from this event was made by the LVK network of observatories, involving the LIGO detector in the United States, Virgo in Italy and KAGRA in Japan.
The latest discovery, given the name GW231123 (The assigned name of the gravitational wave).
Significance of the event
Refine Astrophysical and Cosmological Models: The detection has the potential to refine the current understanding of black hole formation, the evolution of stars, and, possibly, the current models of the universe itself.
It opens up new directions in theories of gravity, astrophysics, cosmology, particle physics, or cosmic strings.
Challenges the current understanding of black hole formation: This merger surpasses all previous detections in mass, resetting our understanding of black hole extremes.
In addition to being extremely massive, they were also spinning incredibly fast, making this a uniquely challenging signal to interpret and suggesting the possibility of a complex formation history.
Insight into Hierarchical Mergers: One proposed possibility for the formation of such massive intermediate-mass black holes (like those detected in GW231123) is through a "hierarchy of mergers" of smaller black holes.
Such a hierarchical process might be responsible for the formation of supermassive black holes, which are the "engine" of any spiral galaxy.
Gravitational Waves as a New Tool: Advancing the Study of Gravitational Waves is particularly crucial for studying dark matter and dark energy, which do not interact with electromagnetic waves and are therefore 'invisible' to conventional methods.
Gravitational Waves are 'ripples' in space-time caused by some of most violent and energetic processes in the Universe.
Albert Einstein (in his General Theory of Relativity) predicted their existence in 1915.
Black Holes
A black hole is a place in space where gravity pulls so much that even light cannot get out. The gravity is so strong because matter has been squeezed into a tiny space.
Black holes don't emit or reflect light, making them effectively invisible to telescopes. However, scientists can see how the strong gravity affects the stars and gas around the black hole.
Scientists can study stars to find out if they are flying around, or orbiting, a black hole.
Formation of Black Hole: Most of black holes are formed from the remnants of a large star that dies in a supernova explosion.
When stars are especially large, the core collapses into a black hole. Otherwise, the core becomes an ultra-dense neutron star.
Types of Black Hole: Stellar, super massive, intermediate and primordial.
