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The binary galactic nuclei in NGC 7727. (ESO/Voggel et al.; ESO/VST ATLAS team) Just 89 million light-years away, in the galaxy NGC 7727, two supermassive black holes are destined to become one. New measurements that probe the heart of the galaxy have found that the nucleus consists of a binary supermassive black hole pair. It's the closest such binary we have found to date, beating out the previous record-holder of 470 million light-years by a significant margin. Moreover, the two supermassive black holes are closer to each other than any other supermassive black hole binary we've seen, separated by a...

Astronomers have discovered the closest pair of supermassive black holes to Earth. Not only are they the most proximate objects of this type to our planet, but they are also closer to each other than any such pairing ever before observed. This closeness indicates that the black holes, which are 89 million light-years away from Earth in the galaxy NGC 7727 in the constellation Aquarius, are moving towards each other and will eventually collide and merge, forming an even more massive black hole.... ...The two supermassive black holes are separated by just 1,600 light-years, half the separation ...