Two mighty beams of energy have been detected shooting in opposite directions from a supermassive black hole inside a distant galaxy - the largest such jets ever spotted, extending about 140 times the diameter of our vast Milky Way galaxy.

Astronomers have discovered the longest black hole jets ever recorded, reaching an astounding 23 million light-years in length. These jets, named Porphyrion, originate from a supermassive black hole located 7.

At 23 million light-years long, the black hole jets are the largest yet seen. How big is 23 million light-years, you ask? It’s the equivalent of 140 Milky Ways lined up end-to-end. The study describing the jet megastructure, dubbed Porphyrion after a mythological Greek giant, is published today in Nature.