While we can’t see black holes with our eyes, astronomers have figured out how to spot these objects in our universe.
![Sukanta Bose.](https://wpcdn.web.wsu.edu/wp-cas/uploads/sites/648/2020/12/Sukanta-Bose.jpg)
One astronomer who is really curious about understanding black holes is my friend Sukanta Bose, a researcher at Washington State University.
“Of course, we cannot see every galaxy,” Bose said. “We see many galaxies that are closer because they are brighter.”
The Sun is a star, but it is far too small to become a black hole. Only heavier stars make black holes. When it comes to stellar mass black holes, astronomers estimate there are ten million to a billion right here in the Milky Way galaxy.
Bose and fellow researchers have been able to spot black holes because of a new way to detect something called gravitational waves. When two black holes collide, they can create a kind of wave that brings information to Earth about its source and helps us learn more about the universe.