Astronomers discover universe’s brightest object – a quasar powered by a black hole that eats a sun a day
by Tory Shepherd from Science | The Guardian on (#6JRBN)
Light from the celestial object, which is 500tn times brighter than our sun, travelled for more than 12bn years to reach Earth
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The brightest known object in the universe, a quasar 500tn times brighter than our sun, was hiding in plain sight", researchers say.
Australian scientists spotted a quasar powered by the fastest growing black hole ever discovered. Its mass is about 17bn times that of our solar system's sun, and it devours the equivalent of a sun a day.
This article was amended to correct the size of the primary mirror of the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope, which is 8 metres, not 39m as previously stated.
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