17-year-old student discovers “cosmic ghost” twice as big as the Milky Way

(NLDO) - Analyzing data from the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory, a student has identified one of the most ghostly objects in the universe.

The remaining "ghost" of a primordial black hole and one of the largest ever observed in the universe has just been identified in data from the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (located in Chile), according to a new study.

Presenting at the American Physical Society (APS) 2025 Global Physics Conference, the study's author - freelance astronomer Julian Shapiro (17 years old, a student at Dalton High School (USA) - said his initial target was exploding star fragments.

So Shapiro focused on objects that resemble the remnants of supernovae (exploding stars) or planetary nebulae that telescopes capture.

"Cosmic ghost" is the remaining light of a resting black hole - Photo: Julian Shapiro/Chilescope T1

But after focusing on a potential object, the young astronomer discovered its structure did not match the wispy filaments characteristic of supernova remnants, and there was no evidence of a supernova at its center.

It is a strange collection of ionized gas filaments present in a region with many potential supermassive black holes.

Using additional measurements from the South African Large Telescope, Shapiro identified high concentrations of ionized oxygen and sulfur scattered throughout the region.

Both of these signals point to the presence of shocked matter, which is material created by an explosive cosmic event.

The results show that the event was much larger than a supernova: an explosion of a supermassive primordial black hole.

The object observed by the observatory was actually just the "ghost" of the black hole, created by a phenomenon called "brightness".

According to Live Science, "echoing" means that long after the black hole at the center of the galaxy explodes, you can still see its "ghost" lingering in the surrounding gas clouds, glowing with leftover radiation.

By the time we see the light reflecting off those gas clouds, the black hole has actually been dormant for a long time.

Shapiro now estimates that the "ghost" is residing in gas clouds about 150,000 to 250,000 light years in diameter, or about 1.5-2 times the diameter of the Milky Way galaxy.

This makes what Shapiro discovered one of the largest "ghosts" ever discovered, and the black hole that created it must be huge as well.

Source: https://nld.com.vn/hoc-sinh-17-tuoi-tim-ra-hon-ma-vu-tru-lon-gap-doi-ngan-ha-196250325094756211.htm