See the beautiful galaxy Centaurus A in all its cosmic glory

By Georgina Torbet September 5, 2021

A stunning image of the distant galaxy Centaurus A has been captured by the Dark Energy Camera, an instrument mounted on the Víctor M. Blanco 4-meter Telescope at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile.

Centaurus A is located over 12 million light-years from Earth in the constellation of Centaurus (The Centaur) and is a huge, active galaxy. One of its strangest features is the jets of material being flung out by the supermassive black hole at its center which flow with such force that the jets reach beyond the limits of the galaxy itself, and which will be the target of future research by the James Webb Space Telescope.

A spectacular portrait of the galaxy Centaurus A captured by astronomers using the Dark Energy Camera. — A spectacular portrait of the galaxy Centaurus A has been captured by astronomers using the Dark Energy Camera mounted on the Víctor M. Blanco 4-meter Telescope at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile. This galaxy’s peculiar appearance — cloaked in dark tendrils of dust — stems from a past interaction with another galaxy, and its size and proximity to Earth make it one of the best-studied giant galaxies in the night sky. CTIO/NOIRLab/DOE/NSF/AURA Acknowledgments: PI: M. Soraisam (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign/NSF's NOIRLab) Image processing: T.A. Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage/NSF’s NOIRLab), M. Zamani (NSF’s NOIRLab) & D. de Martin (NSF’s NOIRLab)

“Radio telescopes reveal a colossal jet of matter spewing outward from the heart of the galaxy,” the National Science Foundation writes in its release of the image. “This jet is accelerated to almost half the speed of light by a supermassive black hole at the center of Centaurus A, and its bright emissions at radio wavelengths make this galaxy one of the most prominent radio sources in the night sky. In fact, in July 2021, the Event Horizon Telescope produced an image of a jet launching from the black hole in Centaurus A, which weighs in at 55 million times the mass of the sun.”

The Dark Energy Camera which captured this image was one of the main instruments used in the Dark Energy Survey, a large-scale astronomical survey which is scanning huge portions of the sky to attempt to unravel the mysteries of dark energy. As part of this survey, earlier this year the researchers released the most accurate map to date of the dark matter in the universe, located by analyzing the movements of distant objects and galaxies and identifying the gravitational effects of dark matter.

With the first set of observations for the Dark Energy Survey completed, the Dark Energy Camera is now being used for a range of scientific projects including capturing stunning images like this one of Centaurus A.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics

Georgina Torbet

Space Writer

Georgina is the Digital Trends space writer, covering human space exploration, planetary science, and cosmology. She…

Space

Astronomers create epic map of more than 1 billion galaxies

This is an image centered on a relatively nearby galaxy cluster dubbed Abell 3158; light from these galaxies had a redshift value of 0.059, meaning that it traveled approximately 825 million years on its journey to Earth. The image is a small part of the DESI Legacy Imaging Surveys — a monumental six-year survey covering nearly half the sky.

Recently an international collaboration of astronomers released the most accurate map yet of all the matter in the universe, to help to understand dark matter, and now this is being joined by the largest two-dimensional map of the entire sky, which can help in the study of dark energy. A data release from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) Legacy Imaging Survey shared the results from six years of scanning almost half of the sky, totaling one petabyte of data from three different telescopes.

This is an image centered on a relatively nearby galaxy cluster dubbed Abell 3158; light from these galaxies had a redshift value of 0.059, meaning that it traveled approximately 825 million years on its journey to Earth. The image is a small part of the DESI Legacy Imaging Surveys — a monumental six-year survey covering nearly half the sky. DESI Legacy Imaging Survey/KPNO/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA; Image processing: T.A. Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage/NSF’s NOIRLab, Jen Miller, M. Zamani & D. de Martin (NSF’s NOIRLab)

Space

Three galaxies are in the process of merging in this Hubble image

A spectacular trio of merging galaxies in the constellation Boötes takes center stage in this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. These three galaxies are set on a collision course and will eventually merge into a single larger galaxy, distorting one another’s spiral structure through mutual gravitational interaction in the process. An unrelated foreground galaxy appears to float serenely near this scene, and the smudged shapes of much more distant galaxies are visible in the background.

This week's image from the Hubble Space Telescope shows a dramatic collision of three different galaxies. The trio, located in the Boötes constellation, are in the process of merging and will eventually form one single large galaxy.

A spectacular trio of merging galaxies in the constellation Boötes takes center stage in this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. These three galaxies are set on a collision course and will eventually merge into a single larger galaxy, distorting one another’s spiral structure through mutual gravitational interaction in the process. An unrelated foreground galaxy appears to float serenely near this scene, and the smudged shapes of much more distant galaxies are visible in the background. ESA/Hubble & NASA, M. Sun

Space

James Webb captures swirls of dust and gas in nearby galaxies

Scientists are getting their first look with the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope’s powerful resolution at how the formation of young stars influences the evolution of nearby galaxies. The spiral arms of NGC 7496, one of a total of 19 galaxies targeted for study by the Physics at High Angular resolution in Nearby Galaxies (PHANGS) collaboration, are filled with cavernous bubbles and shells overlapping one another in this image from Webb’s Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI). These filaments and hollow cavities are evidence of young stars releasing energy and, in some cases, blowing out the gas and dust of the interstellar medium they plough into.

The James Webb Space Telescope is helping astronomers to peer into nearby galaxies and see the elaborate structures of dust and gas which are created by and necessary for star formation.

The Physics at High Angular resolution in Nearby Galaxies, or PHANGS project, involves using data from different telescopes to look at galaxies that are close to us. By using telescopes such as the Hubble Space Telescope and the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array, researchers can collect data in different wavelengths such as the visible light and radio wavelengths.