←back to thread

LIGO detects most massive black hole merger to date

(www.caltech.edu)
360 points Eduard | 2 comments | 14 Jul 25 20:06 UTC | HN request time: 0.547s | source
Show context
WrongOnInternet ◴[14 Jul 25 21:27 UTC] No.44565549[source]▶
> the 225-solar-mass black hole was created by the coalescence of black holes each approximately 100 and 140 times the mass of the Sun.

Does this mean that 15 solar masses were converted into energy? Because that's a LOT of energy.

replies(8): >>44565596 #>>44566469 #>>44566715 #>>44566963 #>>44567727 #>>44568821 #>>44569179 #>>44569506 #
1. richardw ◴[15 Jul 25 09:40 UTC] No.44569506[source]▶
Converted into energy and then escape the black hole, from which light can’t escape? That doesn’t seem to compute. And if it’s converted into gravity waves then we have an excellent obvious candidate for how most energy will escape a black hole. It won’t be waiting around for hawking radiation.
replies(1): >>44569668 #
2. dd_xplore ◴[15 Jul 25 10:15 UTC] No.44569668[source]▶
I think during the merger the event horizon must be changing rapidly, so I guess there's some(or a lot) of chance that matter can escape these merger events. The matter will already have high kinetic energy...