Gravitational shockwave: LIGO catches a 225-solar-mass black-hole smash-up

Gravitational-wave detectors have captured their biggest spectacle yet: two gargantuan, rapidly spinning black holes likely forged by earlier smash-ups fused into a 225-solar-mass titan, GW231123. The record-setting blast strains both the sensitivity of LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA and the boundaries of stellar-evolution theory, forcing scientists to rethink how such cosmic heavyweights arise.