A discovery that has also left scientists breathless: Two huge black holes, more than a hundred times the mass of our sunthey collided and merged, giving life to A single black hole never seen before in size and speed. The result is A cosmic creature of 225 solar massesso great as to put all the current theories on the evolution of the stars in crisis.
The signal of this colossal collision, called GW231123the November 23, 2023 thanks to the detectors of gravitational waves of the network Ligo-Virgo-Kagra (LVK). It is one of the strongest gravitational waves ever recorded: an echo that has crossed the space for billions of years before reaching us.
The universe has just denied science
Until recently, Nobody thought that such gigantic black holes could form naturally. According to current theories, the too large stars collapse differently, and cannot create black holes of this size. Nevertheless, GW231123 is there to prove the opposite.
The previous record dates back to 2021, with the event GW190521which had produced a black hole from “sun” 140 solar masses. This time, however, The cosmic monster born from the merger is far beyond the known limits. According to experts, it is likely that Each of the two black holes involved was born in turn from previous mergers. In practice, a sort of cosmic “matrioska”, made of black holes that incorporate other black holes, as he commented Mark Hannamastrophysicist of the University of Cardiff:
This discovery changes everything, it is a real challenge for our understanding of the universe. Black holes of this dimensions should not exist according to the models we have used for decades.
And to make matters that their huge mass was not enough, the two black holes they turned to themselves at a very high speedalmost at the limit allowed by the laws of physics. Just this rotation made the signal analysis much more difficult and fascinating.
Gravitational waves are the new window on the universe
The gravitational waves They are ripples in space-time caused by very violent cosmic events, such as the merger between black holes. Are detected by ultra-sensible tools such as Ligo (in the United States), Virgo (in Italy) e Kagra (in Japan), which together form the network LVK.
Since 2015, when Ligo observed the first gravitational wave of history, Scientists recorded about 300 black holes melts. But None like this.
Dave Reitzeexecutive director of Ligo, said:
Gravitational waves are opening a completely new window on the universe and GW231123 is one of the most extraordinary signals we have ever seen.
Sophie Biniresearcher at Caltech and team member, he explained:
GW231123 is a very powerful signal, and forced us to push our technology and our scientific models to the limit. This event shows us that we still have a lot to learn about how the universe really works.
Also Charlie Hoyof the University of Portsmouth, underlines how complex a similar event is:
The black holes were rotating so quickly that modeling and interpreting the signal required very sophisticated theoretical tools.
E: scientists are still studying the signal, trying to understand if there are Other hidden cluesas he said Gregorio Carulloof the University of Birmingham:
We could take years to reveal all the secrets of this event. Perhaps there are more complex scenarios that still escape us. These are exciting times for astrophysics.
The complete data of the event will be made public through the Gravitational Wave Open Science CenterSo that other researchers can contribute to analysis. Meanwhile, the official announcement is scheduled during the 24th International Conference on General Relativity and the 16th Conference Edoardo Amaldiin progress a Glasgow from 14 to 18 July 2025.
