Two massive black holes swept clean the center of a galaxy ⚡ экспресс
New JWST/NIRCam observations have revealed a kiloparsec-scale cavity in the stellar distribution at the central galaxy of the Abell402 cluster. HST data rule out dust obscuration and point to a local drop in stellar density: a mass deficit of ~2×10⁹ M☉ within a volume of 0.5 kpc³. On larger scales, a flattened core with a radius of 2.2 kpc suggests the presence of a supermassive black hole with a mass of 6±4×10¹⁰ M☉. At the edge of the cavity, a bright mid-infrared source is detected, and MUSE spectroscopy shows it to be an active nucleus of LINER type. On the opposite side of the cavity, a second AGN candidate is found with a relative radial velocity of 370 km/s; if confirmed, this would be a binary black hole system with a separation of ~1 kpc and a total mass of 6±2×10¹⁰ M☉—the most massive known. The cavity is thought to have arisen from a short-lived dynamical interaction between the supermassive black hole and the stellar field—either through three-body scattering during the hardening of the binary system, or through the induction of a dipolar instability in the stellar density.
Astronomers used the infrared telescope and the old Hubble to discover a gaping void in the center of a galaxy in the Abell 402 cluster—as if an invisible tugboat had pulled billions of stars out of there. The missing mass equals two billion suns: it's not a cloud but a real lack of stars. Near this hole, two powerful sources were found—candidates for supermassive black holes. They orbit at a distance of thousands of light-years and together weigh 60 billion suns—the heaviest pair ever observed. For comparison, the central black hole of the Milky Way is 15,000 times lighter.
The combined gravity of this pair acts like a giant space tugboat: the holes push and eject stars, leaving a swept-clean zone at the center of the galaxy. If the second black hole is confirmed, the system will become the most powerful source of ripples in space-time, which future sensitive detectors could pick up. The first ideas about such waves were developed by Kip Thorne. Remarkably, this pair ejected more stars than shine in some dwarf galaxies: it can accelerate a star to a speed high enough to hurl it forever into intergalactic space.
🎯 The discovered pair of black holes is heavier than all the stars in some small galaxies combined.
🎬 If in 'Interstellar' the hero dove into one black hole, here a pair of giants scooped out a starless abyss around themselves.