Astronomers have detected two black holes simultaneously “expanding” only 750 light-years apart, and will eventually unite into a supermassive black hole.
They were discovered by researchers using the ALMA telescope, the most powerful molecular gas and dust telescope, located in the Atacama Desert.
As the team was looking at two merged galaxies in the constellation of Cancer, 500 million light-years from Earth, they saw two glowing black holes, voraciously devouring the dust, gas and other material that the merger had displaced.
Eventually, they will begin to spin around each other, as the orbit tightens and gas and stars pass between them. Eventually, the black holes will begin to produce gravitational waves much stronger than any previously detected, the researchers said, before they collide.
Experts said the use of ALMA, which stands for Atacama Large Millimeter / submillimeter Array, was a ‘game changer’ and that finding two black holes so close to each other could pave the way for additional studies of the phenomenon. (Russia Today)
