BLACK HOLES SPOTTED ON A COLLISION COURSE

NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory has seen the first evidence of black holes in dwarf galaxies about to impact

- Robert Lea

Astronomers have spotted not one but two dwarf galaxy black hole duos on separate collision courses, the first observational evidence of such a cosmic clash. Just as the black holes are heading for a collision and merger that will leave a more massive black hole behind, the dwarf galaxies they sit in will also merge and form a larger galaxy. The findings could have important implications for our understanding of how these cosmic titans and the galaxies they inhabit grew in the early universe. Scientists examined the colliding black hole pairings using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and found that as the dwarf galaxies are racing towards each other, they are pulling in gas that is ‘feeding’ their inhabitant black holes, causing them to grow even before the merger.