• HOME
  • NEWS
    • BIOENGINEERING
    • SCIENCE NEWS
  • EXPLORE
    • CAREER
      • Companies
      • Jobs
    • EVENTS
    • iGEM
      • News
      • Team
    • PHOTOS
    • VIDEO
    • WIKI
  • BLOG
  • COMMUNITY
    • FACEBOOK
    • FORUM
    • INSTAGRAM
    • TWITTER
  • CONTACT US
Wednesday, June 29, 2022
BIOENGINEER.ORG
No Result
View All Result
  • Login
  • HOME
  • NEWS
    • BIOENGINEERING
    • SCIENCE NEWS
  • EXPLORE
    • CAREER
      • Companies
      • Jobs
        • Lecturer
        • PhD Studentship
        • Postdoc
        • Research Assistant
    • EVENTS
    • iGEM
      • News
      • Team
    • PHOTOS
    • VIDEO
    • WIKI
  • BLOG
  • COMMUNITY
    • FACEBOOK
    • FORUM
    • INSTAGRAM
    • TWITTER
  • CONTACT US
  • HOME
  • NEWS
    • BIOENGINEERING
    • SCIENCE NEWS
  • EXPLORE
    • CAREER
      • Companies
      • Jobs
        • Lecturer
        • PhD Studentship
        • Postdoc
        • Research Assistant
    • EVENTS
    • iGEM
      • News
      • Team
    • PHOTOS
    • VIDEO
    • WIKI
  • BLOG
  • COMMUNITY
    • FACEBOOK
    • FORUM
    • INSTAGRAM
    • TWITTER
  • CONTACT US
No Result
View All Result
Bioengineer.org
No Result
View All Result
Home NEWS Science News

Tangled threads weave through cosmic oddity

Bioengineer by Bioengineer
December 1, 2016
in Science News
0
Share on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on LinkedinShare on RedditShare on Telegram
IMAGE

Credit: NASA, ESA/Hubble, A. Fabian

New observations from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have revealed the intricate structure of the galaxy NGC 4696 in greater detail than ever before. The elliptical galaxy is a beautiful cosmic oddity with a bright core wrapped in system of dark, swirling, thread-like filaments.

NGC 4696 is a member of the Centaurus galaxy cluster, a swarm of hundreds of galaxies all sitting together, bound together by gravity, about 150 million light-years from Earth and located in the constellation of Centaurus.

Despite the cluster's size, NGC 4696 still manages to stand out from its companions — it is the cluster's brightest member, known for obvious reasons as the Brightest Cluster Galaxy. This puts it in the same category as some of the biggest and brightest galaxies known in the Universe.

Even if NGC 4696 keeps impressive company, it has a further distinction: the galaxy's unique structure. Previous observations have revealed curling filaments that stretch out from its main body and carve out a cosmic question mark in the sky (heic1013 – http://www.spacetelescope.org/news/heic1013/), the dark tendrils encircling a brightly glowing centre.

An international team of scientists, led by astronomers from the University of Cambridge, UK, have now used new observations from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope to explore this thread-like structure in more detail. They found that each of the dusty filaments has a width of about 200 light-years, and a density some 10 times greater than the surrounding gas. These filaments knit together and spiral inwards towards the centre of NGC 4696, connecting the galaxy's constituent gas to its core.

In fact, it seems that the galaxy's core is actually responsible for the shape and positioning of the filaments themselves. At the centre of NGC 4696 lurks an active supermassive black hole. This floods the galaxy's inner regions with energy, heating the gas there and sending streams of heated material outwards.

It appears that these hot streams of gas bubble outwards, dragging the filamentary material with them as they go. The galaxy's magnetic field is also swept out with this bubbling motion, constraining and sculpting the material within the filaments.

At the very centre of the galaxy, the filaments loop and curl inwards in an intriguing spiral shape, swirling around the supermassive black hole at such a distance that they are dragged into and eventually consumed by the black hole itself.

Understanding more about filamentary galaxies such as NGC 4696 may help us to better understand why so many massive galaxies near to us in the Universe appear to be dead; rather than forming newborn stars from their vast reserves of gas and dust, they instead sit quietly, and are mostly populated with old and aging stars. This is the case with NGC 4696. It may be that the magnetic structure flowing throughout the galaxy stops the gas from creating new stars.

###

More information

The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between ESA and NASA.

Image credit: NASA, ESA, Andy Fabian

Links

* Images of Hubble – http://www.spacetelescope.org/images/archive/category/spacecraft/

Contacts

Andy Fabian
University of Cambridge
Cambridge, United Kingdom
Tel: +44 1223 337509
Email: [email protected]

Mathias Jäger
ESA/Hubble, Public Information Officer
Garching bei München, Germany
Tel: +49 176 62397500
Email: [email protected]

Media Contact

Mathias Jäger
[email protected]
49-176-623-97500
@Hubble_space

http://www.spacetelescope.org

############

Story Source: Materials provided by Scienmag

Share12Tweet7Share2ShareShareShare1

Related Posts

Man in Black Jacket and Black Backpack Riding Bicycle on Road

New research: Up to 540,000 lives could be saved worldwide by targeting speed and other main areas

June 29, 2022
Group Leader in Chemical Proteomics, Dr. Guillaume Médard, and his research group in the lab.

Shining some light on the obscure proteome

June 29, 2022

Romantic partners can influence each other’s beliefs and behaviors on climate change, new Yale study finds

June 29, 2022

The world’s rivers are changing, here’s how

June 29, 2022
Please login to join discussion

POPULAR NEWS

  • Pacific whiting

    Oregon State University research finds evidence to suggest Pacific whiting skin has anti-aging properties that prevent wrinkles

    37 shares
    Share 15 Tweet 9
  • University of Miami Rosenstiel School selected for National ‘Reefense’ Initiative focusing on Florida and the Caribbean

    35 shares
    Share 14 Tweet 9
  • Saving the Mekong delta from drowning

    37 shares
    Share 15 Tweet 9
  • Sharks may be closer to the city than you think, new study finds

    34 shares
    Share 14 Tweet 9

About

We bring you the latest biotechnology news from best research centers and universities around the world. Check our website.

Follow us

Tags

VehiclesViolence/CriminalsUrbanizationUrogenital SystemVirusWeaponryVaccinesZoology/Veterinary ScienceUniversity of WashingtonVirologyVaccineWeather/Storms

Recent Posts

  • New research: Up to 540,000 lives could be saved worldwide by targeting speed and other main areas
  • Shining some light on the obscure proteome
  • Romantic partners can influence each other’s beliefs and behaviors on climate change, new Yale study finds
  • The world’s rivers are changing, here’s how
  • Contact Us

© 2019 Bioengineer.org - Biotechnology news by Science Magazine - Scienmag.

No Result
View All Result
  • Homepages
    • Home Page 1
    • Home Page 2
  • News
  • National
  • Business
  • Health
  • Lifestyle
  • Science

© 2019 Bioengineer.org - Biotechnology news by Science Magazine - Scienmag.

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
Posting....