NGC 4696: Filaments around a Black Hole
From NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
What's happening at the
center of elliptical galaxy NGC 4696? There, long tendrils of gas and dust have
been imaged in great detail as shown by this recently released image from
the Hubble
Space Telescope.
These filaments appear
to connect to the central
region of the galaxy, a region thought occupied by a supermassive
black hole.
Speculation holds that
this black hole pumps out energy that heats surrounding gas, pushes out cooler
filaments of gas and dust,
and shuts down star
formation.
Balanced by magnetic fields, these
filaments then appear to spiral back in toward
and eventually circle the central black hole.
NGC 4696 is the largest
galaxy in the Centaurus
Cluster of Galaxies, located about 150 million light years from Earth. The featured image shows
a region about 45,000 light years across.
