澳大利亞研究者稱，發現宇宙中一個迄今為止增長速度最快的黑洞。

澳大利亞國立大學研究團隊成員克里斯蒂安·沃爾夫博士在聲明中表示：“這個黑洞每天吸收氣體會引起劇烈摩擦并釋放熱量，所以亮度比整個銀河系還要高出數千倍。”

研究者認為，巨無霸黑洞相當于每兩天吞噬一個與太陽質量相當的天體。沃爾夫說，如果處于銀河系的正中央，不僅“看起來比滿月還要亮十倍”，也會導致地球上生命滅絕，因為黑洞釋放大量X射線。

據太空探索資訊網站Space.com報道，該黑洞離我們很遠，其釋放的光可能要經過約120億年才能到達地球。澳大利亞國立大學的研究者估算，這個黑洞大小相當于200億個太陽，每100萬年體積增長1%。

（既然距離有幾十億光年，就不要取消你的周末活動計劃了。）

——《紐約時報》專欄作家卡爾·齊默點評這條黑洞的新聞

最初，澳大利亞國立大學天文臺Siding Spring Observatory的巡天望遠鏡SkyMapper發現了該黑洞發出的“近紅外光”。在歐洲航天局通訊衛星Gaia的數據幫助下，研究者發現黑洞存在，又由大學里2.3米口徑的望遠鏡通過光譜觀測確認。

接下來，研究學者將分析宇宙誕生初期為何該黑洞可以擴張得如此巨大，并尋找其他類似迅速增長的黑洞。

“通過讓氣體發生電離，迅速擴大的超級黑洞會清除周圍的霧氣，宇宙會透明度會增加。”沃爾夫在聲明中說。

澳大利亞國立大學研究者的發現將在澳大利亞天文學期刊《Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia》上發表。（財富中文網）

譯者：Pessy

審校：夏林

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Australian researchers have discovered what they’ve described as the fastest-growing black hole in the universe.

“This black hole is growing so rapidly that it’s shining thousands of times more brightly than an entire galaxy, due to all of the gases it sucks in daily that cause lots of friction and heat,” Dr. Christian Wolf, a researcher from the Australian National University who was on the team that made the discovery, said according to a statement.

Researchers believe that this “monster” of black hole consumes the mass equivalent to our sun every two days. If placed at the center of our Milky Way galaxy, it would not only “appear 10 times brighter than a full moon,” Wolf said, but it would also make life on Earth impossible due to the x-rays the black hole releases.

And according to Space.com, this black hole is distant enough that it likely released its light around 12 billion years ago, when the ANU researchers estimate that this black hole was as large as 20 billion suns, and grew 1% every million years.

(It’s billions of light years away, so don’t cancel your weekend plans.)

— Carl Zimmer

Initially the SkyMapper telescope at the ANU Siding Spring Observatory discovered light from the black hole in the “near-infrared.” Data from European Space Agency’s Gaia satellite helped discover the black hole, and the spectrograph on the ANU 2.3 meter telescope confirmed the discovery.

The next step for researchers is to learn how it grew so large during the beginnings of our universe, and to find other fast-growing black holes like it.

“Fast-growing supermassive black holes also help to clear the fog around them by ionising gases,” Wolf said in a statement, “which makes the Universe more transparent.”

The researchers’ findings will be published in Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia.