We have never seen them directly (although in 2019 we got the first real “image”), but we know perfectly well that they are there. And ever since the possibility of their existence was raised, black holes have amazed and terrified us at the same time.

Its existence stems from Einstein’s equations on general relativity, raised in 1915. However, it was not until 1939 that Robert Oppenheimer, a theoretical physicist, predicted that they could actually form in nature.

Since then, the more we have learned about them, the more questions have arisen. These objects, which form after the collapse of stars much larger than the Sun, are incredibly large. In fact, they can be monsters of 390 million million kilometers, 40 times the distance from the Sun to Neptune.

In today’s article, then, in addition to understanding (with the relatively little we currently know) what these objects are that absorb everything, including light, and how they are formed, we will see a top with the most colossal black holes in the world. Universe.
What is a black hole?
A black hole is a very strange thing. But much. So much so that inside, the laws of physics that we know stop working. Also, the term itself does not help, as it is not really a hole.

A black hole is actually a celestial body that generates such a strong gravitational field that even electromagnetic radiation cannot escape its attraction. Hence light, which is nothing more than a type of electromagnetic radiation, is also “absorbed”.

But why does this happen? Well, as we well know, absolutely all bodies with mass, depending on how big it is, will generate a greater or lesser gravity. Thus, for example, the Sun has a much greater gravitational power than the Earth.

But in a black hole, this is taken to the extreme. And it is that these celestial bodies are objects of infinite density. A black hole is a singularity in space. In other words, even though what we “see” (that we don’t see) is a three-dimensional dark object, that only designates the radius in which the light can no longer escape, since it has crossed the event horizon.

This event horizon is an imaginary surface that surrounds the hole, giving it a spherical shape, in which the escape velocity, that is, the energy required to escape its attraction, coincides with the speed of light. And since nothing can go faster than light (300,000 km / s), not even photons can escape.

But a black hole, despite the fact that this event horizon is a consequence of its existence, is, in reality, a point of infinite mass and without volume, something that, although it does not make any sense to us, occurs in nature. . This point is what is called a singularity, which becomes a region (which is not either, because there is no volume) in the center of the hole (which is not a hole) in which all matter is destroyed and space-time of the Universe breaks.

The problem is that we cannot (and will never be able to) know what happens beyond the event horizon, since light cannot escape from it. By not letting light escape, these celestial bodies are totally dark.

Be that as it may, we must stay with the idea that a black hole is a singularity in which space-time breaks, obtaining a point of infinite mass and no volume known as a singularity, which makes this body have a density that, by mathematics, is also infinite.

How and why do black holes form?
All of us have ever suffered if some black hole formed next to the Earth and absorbed us. The point is that, as terrifying as the idea of being absorbed by an immense body is, this is totally impossible.

Black holes only form after the death of hypermassive stars. Therefore, regardless of whether or not hypothetical micro black holes exist, for now, the only black holes whose existence is confirmed by science are those that form after the gravitational collapse of very large stars.

So big that not even the Sun (which, compared to others, is a very small star) after dying could generate one. We are talking about hypermassive stars of at least 20 solar masses. If a star this big dies, a black hole can form.

But why does the death of a massive star cause a black hole to form? Well, keep in mind that, during the entire life of a star (which can range from 30 million years to 200,000 million years), it fights a battle between expansion and contraction.

As we know, nuclear fusion reactions take place in the nucleus of stars, which cause the temperatures to be, in the case of the Sun, 15,000,000 ° C. These incredibly high temperatures make the interior a hellish pressure cooker that generates enormous expansion forces.

Now, in contrast to this expansion force, it must be taken into account that the star’s own gravity (we are talking about billions of quadrillion kg) contracts it, thus compensating for the expansion.

As long as its fuel lasts (it can perform nuclear fusion), expansion and contraction will be in equilibrium. Now, when the end of their life approaches, they continue to have the same mass but the energy in their nucleus is lower, so the gravitational force begins to win over the expansion force, until a point is reached where the star collapses under its own gravity.

When this happens in stars similar in size to the Sun (the Sun will die as well), gravitational collapse culminates in incredibly high condensation, giving rise to a white dwarf. This white dwarf, which is the remnant of the star’s core, is one of the densest celestial bodies in the Universe.

There you have a white dwarf. In theory, these also die after cooling, but there has not been time in the history of the Universe for a white dwarf to die.

Now, if we increase the size of the star, things are very different. If the star has a mass between 8 and 20 times that of the Sun (such as the star Betelgeuse), the gravitational collapse, taking into account that the mass is much greater, causes a much more violent reaction: a supernova.

In this case, stellar death does not culminate in the formation of a white dwarf, but in a stellar explosion in which temperatures of 3,000 million ° C are reached and in which enormous amounts of energy are emitted, including gamma rays that can traverse the entire galaxy. In fact, if a star in our galaxy died and generated a supernova, even being several thousand light years away, it could cause the disappearance of life on Earth.

And finally, we come to black holes. These are formed after the gravitational collapse of stars of at least 20 times the mass of the Sun. This collapse causes all the mass to compress into what we have seen before: the singularity.

What are the most colossal black holes in the Cosmos?
All black holes are very large. In fact, the “smallest” ones have masses of at least three times that of the Sun (remember that, for them to form, stars have to be at least 20 times heavier).

But what interests us today are the real monsters: supermassive black holes. These are the ones found in the center of practically all galaxies and their power of attraction is so great that it is what keeps all the stars rotating around them.

Without going any further, our galaxy has at its center a black hole known as Sagittarius A (we have not yet been able to see it). And our Sun, despite being 25,000 light years away from it, is so incredibly large that it orbits at 251 km / s, completing one revolution every 200 million years.

And this black hole, despite its 44 million kilometers in diameter and having a mass 4,300,000 times that of the Sun, is not even among the 100 largest black holes in the Universe. Without a doubt, the Cosmos is an amazing place.

In this article, then, we have collected the 10 largest supermassive black holes, indicating how many solar masses their size corresponds to.

To put it in perspective, we must bear in mind that the Sun has a mass of 1.99 x 10 ^ 30 kg, that is, 1.990 million quadrillion kg. In other words, a solar mass is equivalent to 1,990 million quadrillion kg. And we will deal with sizes of billions of solar masses. Simply unimaginable.

10. NGC 4889: 21 billion solar masses
    Discovered in 2011, the black hole NGC 4889, located in the galaxy of the same name and being at a distance of 308 million light years (despite this, it is the brightest and most visible galaxy from Earth), is 5,200 times larger than Sagittarius A, the one at the center of our galaxy.

9. APM 08279 + 5255: 23 billion solar masses
   Naming is not too good for astronomers. Located at the center of the AMP galaxy, an ultra-luminous galaxy at a distance of 23 billion light years, this black hole is so incredibly large that it has an accretion disk (material orbiting it) of more than 31 trillion kilometers in diameter.

8. H1821 + 643: 30 billion solar masses
Discovered in 2014, the black hole H1821 + 643 is located at the center of a galaxy 3.4 billion light years away and has a diameter of 172 million million kilometers.

7. H1821 + 643: 30 billion solar masses
Discovered in 2014, the black hole H1821 + 643 is located at the center of a galaxy 3.4 billion light years away and has a diameter of 172 million million kilometers.

6. SDSS J102325.31 + 514251.0: 33 billion solar masses
Little is known about this black hole. It was discovered through a space research project founded by the University of Chicago and started in 2000 with the aim of mapping a quarter of the visible sky. Along the way, they discovered one of the largest black holes ever recorded.

5. SMSS J215728.21-360215.1: 34 billion solar masses
Discovered in 2018, this unpronounceable name black hole (J2157-3602 for friends) is one of the largest in the Universe and, for now, the one that is growing the fastest. It is located in the center of a galaxy 12.5 billion light years away.

4. S5 0014 + 81: 40 billion solar masses
Discovered in 2009, this black hole, located in the center of an elliptical galaxy located 120 billion light years away and with a luminosity about 25,000 times greater than that of the Milky Way. This black hole “devours” annually an amount of matter equivalent to 4,000 suns.

3. IC 1101: 40 billion solar masses
This black hole, the third largest known, is at the center of the largest galaxy in the Universe (that we know of) in terms of amplitude. Located 1 billion light-years away, it has a diameter of 6 million light-years (the Milky Way is 52,850 light-years away). Not surprisingly, then, it contains one of the most incredibly large black holes.

2. IC 1101: 40 billion solar masses
This black hole, the third largest known, is at the center of the largest galaxy in the Universe (that we know of) in terms of amplitude. Located 1 billion light-years away, it has a diameter of 6 million light-years (the Milky Way is 52,850 light-years away). Not surprisingly, then, it contains one of the most incredibly large black holes.

TON 618: 66 billion solar masses
We finally reached the winner. Located in the center of a galaxy at a distance of 10 billion light years, the black hole TON 618 is, for now, the largest in the Universe. We are talking about a monster 390 million kilometers in diameter. This is 1,300 times the distance from Earth to the Sun or, to put it another way, 40 times the size of Neptune’s orbit. As we can see, the Universe is an amazing and, at the same time, terrifying place.