Tonantzintla 618[]
Tonantzintla 618, more commonly referred to as TON 618, is a contender for the largest discovered black hole. It is a hyper luminous quasar surrounded by a Lyman-Alpha Blob located in the constellation of Canes Venatici.
Observational History[]
TON 618 was discovered in 1957 during a survey of faint blue stars. It appeared decidedly violet when observed at with the Tonantzintla Observatory in Mexico. It was given the number 618 in the Tonantzintla Catalog. An Italian Radio Survey in 1970 discovered radio emissions from TON 618, indicating that it was a quasar.
Nature[]
TON 618 is a quasar and ultramassive black hole. It's believed to be located in the center of a galaxy, like Sagittarius A*. Many sources would claim that the quasar is over 60,000,000,000 solar masses, but others state a size of 40,000,000,000 solar masses. Size estimates vary from 180 billion km to 360 billion km.
Lyman-Alpha Blob[]
TON 618 is surrounded by a Lyman-Alpha Blob (LAB) around 100 kiloparsecs in diameter. The LAB is around twice the size of the milky way. LABs are large collections of gasses or nebulae that are also considered Lyman-Alpha Emmiters.