Astronomers has for the first
time discovered what may be a free-floating black hole by observing the brightening of a more distant star
As its light was
distorted by the object's strong gravitational field — so-called gravitational microlensing.
The mass of the
invisible compact object is between 1.6 and 4.4 times that of the sun.
Because astronomers think
that the leftover remnant of a dead star must be heavier than 2.2 solar masses in order to collapse to a black hole
The UC Berkeley researchers
caution that the object could be a neutron star instead of a black hole.
Neutron stars are also
dense, highly compact objects, but their gravity is balanced by internal neutron pressure, which prevents further collapse to a black hole.
your X-rays will also rise,” Nicolas Scepi, the new study’s co-author and a postdoctoral researcher at JILA
“Normally, if the ultraviolet rises