Astronomers have identified an ultramassive black hole that could be the largest ever measured, hidden in a distant galaxy known as the Cosmic Horseshoe. This gargantuan object, weighing about 36 billion Suns, warps space so strongly that light from a background galaxy is bent into a perfect Einstein ring.

It may be the most massive black hole ever found. 36 billion times larger than the mass of our Sun, it was previously hidden from astronomers while existing at the heart of the Cosmic Horseshoe galaxy,

The black hole sits five billion light-years from Earth. It lies at the centre of a giant galaxy in the Cosmic Horseshoe system.

Theoretically, there's no limit to how massive a black hole could grow. In practical terms, other constraints, such as the growth rate, suggest that the maximum mass a black hole could achieve within the current 13.8-billion-year lifespan of the Universe is about 50 billion solar masses.

Across the cosmos, heavier galaxies tend to host heavier black holes, a pattern known as the M–σ relation. But the Cosmic Horseshoe’s black hole sits about one and a half standard deviations above that trend, adding to evidence that the most massive galaxies may grow their central black holes more quickly — or in different ways — than smaller ones.

Scientists have tapped into gravitational lensing and stellar dynamics to confirm the existence of a black hole with 36 billion solar masses.

The discovery sets a new benchmark for how early supermassive black holes can form and raises questions about their origin and growth. "When looking for black holes, this is about as far back as you can practically go,

Astronomers have uncovered what may be the most massive black hole ever found, 36 billion times the mass of our Sun, hidden at the heart of the Cosmic Horseshoe galaxy. Located 5 billion light-years away,