Posted on 06/01/2011 3:01:47 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
[Credit: ESO/WFI (visible); MPIfR/ESO/APEX/A. Weiss et al. (microwave); NASA/CXC/CfA/R. Kraft et al. (X-ray); Inset: NASA/TANAMI/C. Müller et al. (radio)] Explanation: Jets of streaming plasma expelled by the central black hole of a massive spiral galaxy light up this composite image of Centaurus A. The jets emanating from Cen A are over a million light years long. Exactly how the central black hole expels infalling matter is still unknown. After clearing the galaxy, however, the jets inflate large radio bubbles that likely glow for millions of years. If excited by a passing front, radio bubbles can even light up again after a billion years. X-ray light is depicted in the above composite image in blue, while microwave light is false-colored orange. The inset image in radio light shows newly imaged, never seen-before details of the innermost light year of the central jet.
(Excerpt) Read more at apod.nasa.gov ...
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I wonder if it is possible to harness that energy. Just think of all the ready kilowatts!
I read somewhere that one possible explanation for these jets is that the black hole sucked in some very large energetic object, like a star...an enormous cosmic belch is what results....
Beautiful pic. :-)
If the orange clouds are microwaves, maybe we could get a little cooking done out there. ;-p
It still amazes me that we can look at this photo and see something that is “over a million light years long.”
I had a nice enlarged pic all ready to post yesterday of the black hole.
I waited and waited and waited.
And waited.
The lights were all on, but nobody, it seems, was home.
Good thing I got CFL bulbs or my power bill would ginormous.
Last Observing night I was looking at this for my Caldwell list. It didn’t look anything like this.
Wouldn’t that be something. Someone would figure out how to make money on it.
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