CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. \u2014 Astronomers have discovered what may be the brightest object in the universe, a quasar with a black hole at its heart growing so fast that it swallows the equivalent of a sun a day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The record-breaking quasar shines 500 trillion times brighter than our sun. The black hole powering this distant quasar is more than 17 billion times more immense than our sun, an Australian-led team reported Monday in the journal Nature Astronomy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While the quasar resembles a mere dot in images, scientists envision a ferocious place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The rotating disk around the quasar\u2019s black hole \u2014 the luminous swirling gas and other matter from gobbled-up stars \u2014 is like a cosmic hurricane.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThis quasar is the most violent place that we know in the universe,\u201d lead author Christian Wolf of Australian National University said in an email.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The European Southern Observatory spotted the object, J0529-4351, during a 1980 sky survey, but it was thought to be a star. It was not identified as a quasar \u2014 the extremely active and luminous core of a galaxy \u2014 until last year. Observations by telescopes in Australia and Chile\u2019s Atacama Desert clinched it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe exciting thing about this quasar is that it was hiding in plain sight and was misclassified as a star previously,\u201d Yale University\u2019s Priyamvada Natarajan, who was not involved in the study, said in an email.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
These later observations and computer modeling have determined that the quasar is gobbling up the equivalent of 370 suns a year \u2014 roughly one a day. Further analysis shows the mass of the black hole to be 17 to 19 billion times that of our sun, according to the team. More observations are needed to understand its growth rate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The quasar is 12 billion light-years away and has been around since the early days of the universe. A light-year is 5.8 trillion miles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n