How many stellar black holes are there in the Milky Way?

Black holes remain one of astronomy’s most intriguing mysteries, but science is working to better understand the strange properties of these regions of space-time that swallow everything around them, even light.

However, there is no single type of black hole. Experts say these regions of space They can basically be divided into three categories: stellar, supermassive, and intermediate-mass black holes.

The most common in the universe are the stars and supermassive ones that scientists observe the most. Generally, Stellar black holes are found more frequently because it is more common for massive stars to run out of fuel and collapse under their own gravity.

The scientific community believes that a fourth type of black hole, known as a primordial black hole, may be hidden in the universe, possibly formed during the birth of the universe. They theorize that this species was created at the same time as the Big Bang, at sizes up to 100 thousand times that of the Sun.

“The matter inside a black hole is so dense that nothing, not even light, can escape its enormous gravitational pull. The vast majority of stellar-mass black holes we know of swallow material from a nearby companion star. The captured material falls onto the black hole. The object collapsed at high speed, overheated and emitted x-rays… The European Space Agency (ESA) announced in a statement that the average mass of black holes known to be of stellar origin in our galaxy is approximately 10 times the mass of our Sun.

Finally, How many stellar-mass black holes are there in our galaxy? To answer this question, we gathered information from astronomers, astrophysicists, and other experts in the field.

Stellar black holes in the Milky Way

Stellar-mass black holes form when massive stars collapse in on themselves, creating an all-engulfing region of space. The mass of the star must be more than ten times that of the Sun. Therefore, when all the fuel in its core runs out, it will collapse and explode as a supernova.

In the case of a star with the required mass, The gravitational collapse after the supernova phase may be so intense that the remaining mass will form a stellar black hole.

Current estimate of scientists Suggests there are up to 100 million stellar-mass black holes scattered across the Milky Way; but this is just a statistical estimate. It is not that easy to detect a black hole far away in space because it does not emit light and swallows everything around it. About 20 of these have been found to date, but there are other candidates being studied.

The mass of these cosmic objects can represent just a few times the mass of the Sun or reach hundreds of times. Shift, Stellar black holes continue to gain mass through gravitational interactions with other celestial bodies, such as collisions with stars.

“What remains depends on the mass of the star before it exploded. If it were close to the threshold, a superdense neutron star the size of a city would form. If it were about 20 times the mass of the Sun or more, the core of the star would collapse into stellar-mass black holes. The masses of these newborn objects would be Depending on the mass of the star when the supernova begins, it can range from several to hundreds of times the mass of the Sun, NASA says, and may continue to gain mass through collisions with stars and other black holes.

The largest stellar black hole found near Earth

In a study published in the scientific journal Astronomy & Astrophysics, a team of scientists Discovery of the largest stellar black hole ever observed in the Milky Way. Called Gaia BH3, its mass is approximately 33 times the mass of the Sun. The object was found using data collected by ESA’s Gaia mission and is considered the second closest black hole ever detected.

Researchers claim that Gaia BH3 is located in the constellation Aquila, approximately 1,924 light-years from the Solar System. It would not have been discovered unless it was in binary orbit with a star; Therefore, the movement of the region can only be explained by the existence of a stellar black hole.

“No one expected to find a hitherto undetected massive black hole lurking nearby. This is a once-in-a-lifetime discovery,” said the astronomer and his collaborators from the National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) in France. The author of the article is Pasquale Panuzzo.

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