This Is the Most Powerful Event Possible in the Universe

And we might finally be able to detect it

A computer simulation shows gravitational waves resulting from a powerful cosmic event. Image by the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics.

If you search for the universe’s most powerful event, many sources will tell you that gamma-ray bursts are the most energetic explosions outside of the Big Bang itself. They are described as the brightest and strongest explosions in the universe, with some releasing 300 times more energy in a few seconds than our sun will release over the course of billions of years. It makes sense. These bursts of electromagnetic radiation stem from violent objects: black holes, neutron stars, hypernovas. The most explosive, energetic event ever observed is one such gamma-ray burst, discovered by a NASA observatory and releasing 5 x 10⁵⁴ joules (J) of energy. But still, there remains something even more powerful.

Similarly impressive events include massive stars exploding into iconic supernovas, quasars, and merging neutron stars which have been aptly named “kilnovae”. Although active galaxies can rival the energy output of gamma-ray bursts as their black holes consume and accelerate the material around them, active galaxies emit their 10⁵⁴ J over millions of years, not in the much more abrupt seconds and minutes of gamma-ray bursts.

And what about black hole mergers? When two black holes merge they, ever so momentarily, are more luminous than…