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The Salpeter timescale (or Salpeter time) is the timescale for black hole growth, based upon the Eddington limit. A growing black hole heats its accreting material, which glows, and at some level of accretion, the resulting luminosity would fully counteract the accretion, thus the actual rate is limited. The timescale is 5×107 years, i.e., the limitation imposed by Eddington luminosity suggests a black hole will grow to no more than a factor of e in that many years.