Nearest Large Black Hole: Astronomers have discovered the nearest giant black hole to Earth with the help of the Hubble Space Telescope. It is a rare ‘medium mass black hole’. The mass of this black hole is approximately equal to 8,200 Suns. It is much larger than a stellar mass black hole but extremely small compared to a supermassive black hole.
The newly discovered medium mass black hole is located in a group of about ten million stars called Omega Centauri. This black hole is located about 18,000 light years from Earth. Omega Centauri is the remains of an ancient galaxy that has been swallowed by our Milky Way galaxy.
The discovery of this black hole suggests that Omega Centauri is actually the core of a small, separate galaxy whose growth was suddenly halted by the Milky Way. If this had not happened, this black hole would probably have become a supermassive black hole.
Three types of black holes
Usually the black holes we talk about are stellar black holes or supermassive black holes. The mass of stellar mass black holes is 5 to 100 times the mass of the Sun. Supermassive black holes are so big that they are called ‘supermassive black holes’. These giant black holes can be hundreds of thousands to tens of billions of times larger than the mass of our Sun. They are usually found in the centers of galaxies.
The nearest black hole
The closest stellar mass black hole discovered by scientists so far is named Gaia-BH1. It is only 1,560 light years away from Earth. We have already told you about the discovery of medium mass black holes. The nearest supermassive black hole to Earth is Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*) which is present in the center of our galaxy. Sgr A* has a mass 4.3 million times that of the Sun and is located 27,000 light-years from Earth.
