Sagittarius A* (IMAGE)
Caption
This is the first-ever image of Sagittarius A* (or Sgr A* for short), the supermassive black hole at the center of our Milky Way galaxy. It is the first direct visual evidence of the presence of this black hole and was captured by the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT), an array that linked together eight radio observatories across the planet to form a single "Earth-sized" virtual telescope. The telescope is named after the "event horizon," the boundary of the black hole beyond which no light can escape. Although we cannot see the event horizon itself, glowing gas orbiting around the black hole reveals a telltale signature: a dark central region, called a "shadow," surrounded by a bright ring-like structure. The new view captures light bent by the powerful gravity of the black hole, which is four million times more massive than our sun. The image of the Sgr A* black hole is an average of different images extracted from the EHT's 2017 observations.
Credit
EHT Collaboration
Usage Restrictions
For use in news stories
License
Licensed content