Black Hole Swarm Moving Through Our Galaxy

And yes, there is a black hole swarm out there right now, recently discovered by a group of scientists. But don’t worry, our planet isn’t under threat of getting sucked up into it. At least not anytime soon. Astronomers stumbled on Palomar 5, a cluster of black holes about 80,000 light-years away from us. 

It appears there are about 100 stellar-mass black holes at the center of this swarm with the entire thing stretching across a whopping 30,000 light years. It’s almost like an ocean of black holes relative to the size of the galaxy (or, at minimum, a big lake). 

This swarm of black holes likely comes from the beginning of time, when our universe was concerned, and it can tell us a great deal about how the galaxy was initially formed. This globular cluster can contain thousands or even millions of stars and has incredibly high density.

The latter gets denser and stronger near the center. With this black hole swarm, there is a speculation that at some point, and we are talking in the billions of years here, the stars will dissolve into stellar streams leaving only the black holes behind. Comforting for sure. 

Up until now, these black hole swarms and globular clusters were not easy to identify, but the Gaia space Observatory, ESA’s billion-star surveyor, has significantly improved the process.

The mission there is to create a three-dimensional map of the millions of stars in the Milky Way all with the goal of understanding how the universe took its shape. 

These black hole swarms do not pose a threat to Earth at all, which is great news on the human front. The black holes are contained within the globular cluster and aren’t moving at all through space.

Plus, their gravitational influence is pretty limited all things considered. Basically, it’s all just part of the galactic evolution, something astronomers and scientists will likely always be trying to understand. 

When we see black holes in movies or television shows, they are often posing a threat to humanity. And while that might be the case at some point, for the most part those elements remain purely science fiction.

But the part where we can now discover how black holes take shape and how the universe reacts and interacts on the stellar level is exciting to say the least.

Do I want to hear about black hole swarms coming to a galaxy near us? Of course not, but for now, we are safe. Though I wouldn’t be shocked if this was part of a sci-fi movie in the near future. 

Source: Nature Astronomy