Cygnus X-1
The first widely accepted black hole.
Cygnus X-1 is an X-ray source in Cygnus and the first widely accepted black hole. It was discovered in 1964 and is one of the strongest X-ray sources seen from Earth.
It is a high-mass X-ray binary about 7,000 light-years away: a black hole of about 21 solar masses pulls matter from a blue supergiant into a hot accretion disk.
Quick Facts
- Type
- Black hole X-ray binary
- Constellation
- Cygnus
- Distance
- ~7,000 light-years
- Discovered
- 1964
More in Stellar Entities & Systems
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