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The closest black hole to Earth detected by astronomers

The closest known black hole to Earth is only 1600 light years away.

Astronomers have discovered the closest known black hole to Earth, just 1,600 light-years away.

Scientists reported Friday that this black hole is 10 times more massive than our sun. And it is three times closer than the previous record.

It was identified by observing the motion of its companion star, which orbits the black hole at roughly the same distance as Earth orbits the sun.

The black hole was initially identified using the European Space Agency’s Gaia spacecraft, said Kareem El-Badry of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.

El-Badry and his team followed up with the Gemini International Observatory in Hawaii to confirm their findings, which were published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

Researchers don’t know how the system formed in the Milky Way. Called Gaia BH1, it is located in the constellation Ophiuchus, the Serpent Bearer.

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