Breaking

Ancient explosion in Milky Way's core lit up gas outside the galaxy - Space.com
Jun 04, 2020 1 min, 7 secs

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope is further probing the remnants of a massive space explosion visible from Earth 3.5 million years ago.

The black hole's activity likely came from a large hydrogen cloud, about 100,000 times the mass of the sun, falling onto material circling near the black hole.

Ultraviolet radiation from the subsequent explosion penetrated far above and below our galaxy's plane, stripping atoms of their electrons in the Magellanic Stream.

To learn more about the ancient explosion, the powerful ultraviolet eyes of Hubble peered at quasars (cores of active galaxies) in the background of the Magellanic Stream.

The study showed differences in the gas between the Magellanic Stream and the Leading Arm.

The ions in the Magellanic Stream were formed by the black hole explosion, even though the stream is roughly 200,000 light-years away from the black hole!

The Magellanic Stream isn't the only cosmic structure affected by the explosion of Sgr A*!

NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope spotted the plasma, which is called Fermi Bubbles, in 2010.

"We always thought that the Fermi Bubbles and the Magellanic Stream were separate and unrelated to each other and doing their own things in different parts of the galaxy's halo," said Fox, who also participated in the 2015 Hubble study.

"Now we see that the same powerful flash from our galaxy's central black hole has played a major role in both.".

RECENT NEWS

SUBSCRIBE

Get monthly updates and free resources.

CONNECT WITH US

© Copyright 2024 365NEWSX - All RIGHTS RESERVED