3 publishers · first seen Wed, 28 Oct 2026 10:00 UTC · updated Fri, 30 Oct 2026 21:30 UTC
New research suggests that under extreme conditions, a single black hole could split into two, a process that would require the black hole to be spinning at nearly its maximum possible rate. The study, published in Physical Review D, indicates that such a split would involve the black hole's event horizon dividing in a shape resembling trousers, termed 'pair-of-pants topologies', with one black hole forming in each 'leg'.
The researchers, including Francesco Sannino from the University of Naples Federico II, found that entropy laws usually prevent black holes from splitting, but a loophole may exist for rapidly rotating ones. The resulting black holes would need to separate quickly to avoid merging again, a condition that narrows the possibility to black holes rotating close to their maximum speed. Small primordial black holes may be more likely to split than larger astrophysical ones, and such events might be detectable through gamma-ray signals observed by telescopes like Fermi-LAT.
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