Fastest-growing black hole of the last 9 billion years

SMSS J114447.77-430859.3 (J1144 for short) is the fastest-growing black hole of the last 9 billion years .

The light from the new black hole took 7 billion years to reach Earth .

It is eating the equivalent of 80 of our Suns every year, or an Earth every second .

J1144 is ionising removing electrons from a very large region of the gas around the black hole.

It could even tell us something about our own Milky Way .

Using telescopes in Chile , Onken believes it may be possible to see the rotation of the surrounding gas.

The team has also used historical observations, which serendipitously captured the event.