First Rogue Black Hole Ever Discovered And It’s Only 5,000 Light-Years Away @TheCosmosNews

#thecosmosnews An international team of researchers has confirmed that a possible microlensing event witnessed in 2011 was due to the presence of a free-floating black hole roaming through interstellar space—the first of its kind ever observed. The group has published a paper describing their findings on the arXiv preprint server. Scientists have assumed for some time that there are many black holes wandering around in interstellar space, but until now they had not found one. This is due to the very nature of a black hole—they are difficult to spot against the black backdrop of space. Still, the evidence for their existence was strong. Prior research has shown that black holes are often formed when stars reach the end of their lives and their cores collapse, generally producing a supernova. And because many such supernova have been observed, it seemed clear that many black holes must have been created as a result.