Milky Way’s ‘most massive’ stellar black hole , 33 times bigger than Sun, found lurking near Earth

Scientists have discovered what they call “Milky Way's most massive" black hole yet. To put its size into perspective, it’s at least 33 times bigger than the Sun and located 2,000 light years away from us. Astronomers at the European Southern Observatory's Gaia mission spotted the gigantic black hole when they noticed a star wobbling as it orbited the area.

The black hole has been named Gaia BH3. It’s the second-closest black hole to Earth and sits in the Aquila constellation. Gaia is a Latin word which means “the eagle”.

"No one was expecting to find a high-mass black hole lurking nearby, undetected so far," said Pasquale Panuzzo, an astronomer from the National Centre for Scientific Research at the Observatoire de Paris. "This is the kind of discovery you make once in your research life," the astronomer added.

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How are black holes formed?

Black holes are formed when stars reach the end of their lives. Most of these stars inflate, lose mass and cool down to become “white dwarfs” but others lose less mass that don’t contain heavy elements. These stars are called ‘metal-poor stars’ and instead of becoming white dwarfs, they collapse in on themselves and form a black hole.

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It indicates that the star that collapsed to form a Gaia BH3 black hole must have been a metal-poor star. More clues can be derived from the "wobbly" star orbiting it as stars in pairs tend to be similar.

Interestingly, the wobbly star is also a metal-poor star.

50 stellar black holes in the Milky Way

Scientists at NASA believe there are more than 50 stellar black holes in the Milky Way galaxy.

Earlier in January, astronomers said they had discovered the oldest black hole ever, dating back to the early universe more than 13 billion years ago.

The black hole is located in an ancient galaxy called GN-z11, located 13.4 billion light years away, and was spotted using the James Webb Space Telescope.

(With inputs from agencies)