Scientists Discover What Appears to Be the Largest Black Hole in the Universe, So Heavy That It Completely Bends the Light Around It Into a Giant Ring

Astronomers have found a potentially record-breaking black hole 36 billion times the Sun's mass in the Cosmic Horseshoe galaxy, five billion light years away. This dormant black hole bends light from a background galaxy into an almost perfect Einstein ring. Measured using gravitational effects, its discovery offers insights into supermassive black hole growth, suggesting galaxy mergers play a key role, as the Cosmic Horseshoe formed from multiple large galaxies collapsing together.