Monster black hole lurks in the early universe

Behemoth grew to mass of 12 billion suns in less than 900 million years

black hole

LARGER THAN IT LOOKS  Gas swirls around a 12-billion-solar-mass black hole (illustrated), the most massive one known in the early universe.

Zhaoyu Li/Shanghai Astronomical Observatory

When the universe was young, some black holes were terribly greedy.