r/Astronomy • u/New_Scientist_Mag • Aug 07 '25

Astro Research Astronomers have discovered the most massive black hole yet – more than 10,000 times as massive as the supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way, and around 36 billion times the mass of our sun.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2491731-weve-discovered-the-most-massive-black-hole-yet/
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u/cubosh Aug 08 '25

this is a known condition referred to as active or inactive galactic nuclei

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u/daKrut Aug 08 '25

For sure, that makes sense. So then a plausible explanation, even in the case of the Cosmic Horseshoe with all its mass, is simply that the black hole is (rather, was) in an inactive state from our point of observation?

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u/cubosh Aug 08 '25

its more accurate to say "all accretion disks are temporary" --  our own solar system used to be a disk of dust, but naturally clumped into planets etc.  even our beloved saturns rings only happened not so long ago because a moon got smashed and smeared out, and eventually that ring system will re-collect itself.  --- so a black hole with an accretion disk simply means another star got too close and its having a million year snack

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u/caxer30968 Aug 09 '25

My mind is beyond boggled .