March 29, 2024

Hubble telescope shows a mysterious celestial body – what is it?

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from: Tanya Banner

At first glance, object Z 229-15, imaged here by the Hubble Space Telescope, appears to be a distinctly spiral galaxy. But in fact it is much more than that, as Issa asserts. © ESA/Hubble & NASA, A Barth, R Mushotzky

The Hubble Space Telescope is photographing a strange celestial body that, at first glance, appears to be a spiral galaxy. But there is a lot behind that.

BALTIMORE — For 33 years, the Hubble Space Telescope has been imaging galaxies, planets, and many other celestial bodies in space. One of the latest recordings now shows something particularly mysterious. Z 229-15 is about 390 million light-years away in the constellation Lyra.

At first glance, Z 229-15 appears to be a spiral galaxy, two spiraling arms full of stars rising from the bright center. But the object is much more than that, the European Space Agency Esa wrote in a statement on the Hubble image.

The Hubble Space Telescope is photographing a mysterious object

First and foremost, the object is a galaxy – a large collection of stars held together by gravity. But there is more. “Z 229-15 “is one of those interesting celestial objects that are defined as several things,” says Esa. The object could be an active galactic nucleus (AGN), a quasar, or a Seyfert galaxy. But what is it? Which definition best applies to the depicted object?” The answer is that it’s all of these things at the same time, because these three definitions overlap so much,” Issa writes on the Hubble website..

Object in the Universe: Active Galaxy Core, Quasar, or Seyfert Galaxy?

in active galactic nucleus (AGN) It is a small region within active galaxies that is noticeably brighter than the galaxy’s stars – the galaxy’s AGN often outshines it. The brightness causes a supermassive black hole to form in the center of the galaxy, which attracts material. This disk-shaped matter orbits around the black hole and is gradually being devoured. The disk of matter gets so hot that it gives off a lot of energy – the galactic core appears very bright.

in quasar It is a special type of active galactic nucleus. It is usually very bright and very far from Earth. The definition also includes the fact that a quasar appears roughly as a point in the visible range of light as a star – hence this object also gets its name. It is derived from the term “quasi-stellar radio source”, meaning “star-like radio source”.

One sv galaxy It is an active galaxy with a very bright core, but the rest of the galaxy can be seen though the bright core. Thus, “Z 229-15” is a Seyfert galaxy that contains a quasar and hosts by definition an active galactic nucleus. The European Space Agency said classification in astronomy can be challenging. (unpaid bill)

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