Posted on 11/19/2015 3:42:37 AM PST by SunkenCiv
Explanation: What's the closest active galaxy to planet Earth? That would be Centaurus A, only 11 million light-years distant. Spanning over 60,000 light-years, the peculiar elliptical galaxy is also known as NGC 5128. Forged in a collision of two otherwise normal galaxies, Centaurus A's fantastic jumble of young blue star clusters, pinkish star forming regions, and imposing dark dust lanes are seen here in remarkable detail. The colorful galaxy portrait is a composite of image data from space- and ground-based telescopes large and small. Near the galaxy's center, left over cosmic debris is steadily being consumed by a central black hole with a billion times the mass of the Sun. As in other active galaxies, that process generates the radio, X-ray, and gamma-ray energy radiated by Centaurus A.
(Excerpt) Read more at 129.164.179.22 ...
[Processing & Copyright: Robert Gendler, Roberto Colombari; Image Data: Hubble Space Telescope, European Southern Observatory]
I love that one.
It’s the Hamburger Galaxy!
It do NOT look like that in the telescope, at least from here in South Georgia. Maybe in Australia. :D
I think they ment RADIO-active. It is a high energy radio source. Very noisy.
There is a lot going on in there hidden by that gas cloud.
Makes sense. Thanks.
“I think they ment RADIO-active. It is a high energy radio source. Very noisy.”
It’s not only active in radio, but in high-energy radiation like X-rays and gamma rays. Often active galaxies exhibit two large jets of material originating from the central black hole.
“There is a lot going on in there hidden by that gas cloud.”
That’s for certain! Every so often an entire star system gets sucked in to the black hole...
Active Galaxies and Quasars
http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/science/objects/active_galaxies1.html
Active galaxies are galaxies which have a small core of emission embedded in an otherwise typical galaxy. This core may be highly variable and very bright compared to the rest of the galaxy... For “normal” galaxies, we can think of the total energy they emit as the sum of the emission from each of the stars found in the galaxy. For the “active” galaxies, this is not true. There is a great deal more emitted energy than there should be... and this excess energy is found in the infrared, radio, UV, and X-ray regions of the electromagnetic spectrum.
:’)
Thanks for taking the effort to educate.
My pleasure.
Oh my! That’s another pretty one, and The Big One on the APOD is
even prettier.
Thank you for the post, ping, and information, Mr. Civilizations.
Nice star picture. Too bad it has all that hazy stuff and smears in the middle covering the stars. Just kidding. ;-)
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