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takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

Even small black holes emit gravitational waves when they collide, and LIGO heard them [latimes.com]

LIGO scientists say they have discovered gravitational waves coming from another black hole merger, and it's the tiniest one they've ever seen.

The findings, submitted [arxiv.org] to the Astrophysical Journal Letters, could shed light on the diversity of the black hole population — and may help scientists figure out why larger black holes appear to behave a little differently from the smaller ones.

"Its mass makes it very interesting," said Salvatore Vitale, a data analyst and theorist with the LIGO Lab at MIT. The discovery, he added, "really starts populating more of this low-mass region that [until now] was quite empty."

The black holes had estimated masses of around 12 and 7 solar masses.

Related: LIGO May Have Detected Merging Neutron Stars for the First Time [soylentnews.org]
First Joint Detection of Gravitational Waves by LIGO and Virgo [soylentnews.org]
"Kilonova" Observed Using Gravitational Waves, Sparking Era of "Multimessenger Astrophysics" [soylentnews.org]

Original Submission