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The black hole is as unexpected as it is vast, for it accounts for nearly a seventh of its galaxy's mass, a finding that may rewrite theories of cosmic formation, they said.
It accounts for a whopping 14 percent of the galaxy's mass, compared with the 0.1 percent that is the norm for galactic black holes.
NGC 1277 is already the second biggest black hole ever observed, and it is a strong contender for the top spot, for the current record holder, spotted in 2011, has still not been precisely calculated. It is somewhere between six and 37 billion solar masses.
You did not say what the source said when you stated "17 BILLION times larger than our sun", so please be careful or you may get a response like this:
Originally posted by curiousrb
A black hole has been found that is 17 BILLION times larger than our sun!
This is possibly one of the biggest black holes ever to be observed.
Black hole
Originally posted by curiousrb
I personally don't think many if any understand black holes. We know how they form and what they seem to do. But there must be a lot more to it. And I think the mystery makes it all that more interesting.
Please post a link to this "well-established fact that as scale decreases to levels associated with quantum mechanics, the force of gravity skyrockets".
Originally posted by Son of Will
the well-established fact that as scale decreases to levels associated with quantum mechanics, the force of gravity skyrockets to inexplicably high levels.
Modified gravity theories have been proposed, such as MOND (MOdified Newtonian Dynamics), and others. However, no known modified gravity theory can explain observations in the bullet cluster alone, so even if MOND or similar is true, something else must be going on...if not dark matter, then something that produces similar effects:
Likewise, as scale increases to the size of galaxies, gravity once again breaks down. Hence the ad hoc creation of "dark matter". It was only created to help classical models of gravity account for the observed rotation of galaxies. Instead of going back to the drawing board, as is the standard scientific procedure when a theory fails to account for laboratory or observational data, a few scientists concocted a new substance entirely.
An 8-sigma significance spatial offset of the center of the total mass from the center of the baryonic mass peaks cannot be explained with an alteration of the gravitational force law, and thus proves that the majority of the matter in the system is unseen.
Originally posted by Arbitrageur
...
I did a few more comparisons. If the Earth was a black hole, it would be roughly the size of a peanut.
In contrast, the event horizon of this black hole is about 330 times the average radius of the Earth's orbit.
So yeah, it's freaking huge any way you look at it.edit on 30-11-2012 by Arbitrageur because: clarification