After three years of observation of ultra-bright galactic clusters, located 300 million light-years from Earth, astronomers announced the discovery of a new type of black holes.

According to researchers, in his article in the journal Science, to science were known two types of black holes: a small, several times heavier than the Sun, and the giant with the gravity of many millions of Suns.

Huge holes are located almost exclusively in the Central regions of galaxies and able to absorb the entire star system.

An international team of researchers using space x-ray Observatory "Chandra" (Chandra X-ray Observatory) and orbital telescope SWIFT has detected an intermediate type of black holes is medium in size. So, the mass of the new object is about 90 thousand Solar masses.

Unusual black hole, called HLX-1 (Hyper-Luminous X-ray source 1), was discovered almost by accident. Scientists noticed bright flashes of x-rays and radio waves coming not from a spiral galaxy, and from the facility, located behind her in the distance of 12 thousand light-years.

"Our observations in the period from 2009 to 2010 showed that HLX-1 behaves like a small black holes. But for a more precise classification we needed another year of observation radiosystemy" - said the head of research Natalie Webb (Natalie Webb) from center for the study of cosmic radiation.

The researchers suggest that such black holes are medium in size may appear in the centre of the globular clusters, where thousands of stars under the influence of gravitational forces are very tightly. In addition, they could be formed after the death of giant stars that existed at the dawn of the Universe.

Detection HLX-1 can help others understand the process of formation of giant black holes.

"It is possible that the intermediate stage is the predecessor of larger entities, and may grow by acquiring a sufficient quantity of matter or teaming up with several similar" - says Webb.

Scientists acknowledge that any conclusions can be made only after will be able to detect other "medium" black holes.