This black-hole collision just made gravitational waves even more interesting

This black-hole collision just made gravitational waves even more interesting



A visualization of a collision between two differently sized black holes. (N. Fischer, H. Pfeiffer, A. Buonanno (Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics), Simulating eXtreme Spacetimes (SXS) Collaboration)

Mismatched black-hole collision boggles

Gravitational-wave astronomers witnessed a merger between black holes of two greatly different sizes, one nearly four times more massive than the other. The unprecedented observation gave them insight into how one of the black holes spins, which had eluded them in previous gravitational-wave experiments examining mergers of equally sized black holes. The new data promise new ways to test Einstein’s general theory of relativity. “It’s an exceptional event,” said astrophysicist Maya Fishbach.

Nature | 5 min readReference: arXiv preprint