NASA's Swift Observatory Detects Wandering Black Hole Devouring a Star

NASA's Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory has observed a rare supermassive black hole, located unusually far from a galactic core, as it ripped apart and consumed a star. This tidal disruption event, which briefly outshone its entire host galaxy in ultraviolet light, revealed a black hole approximately a million times the Sun's mass. The discovery, detailed in The Astrophysical Journal Letters on July 27, validates a new technique for finding otherwise invisible wandering black holes.