Centaurus A Nucleus

Esahubble_opo9814f_1024

esahubble_opo9814f May 14th, 1998

Credit: E.J. Schreier, (STScI) and NASA/ESA

Hubble's Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer was used to peer past the dust to discover a tilted disk of hot gas at the galaxy's center (white bar running diagonally across image center). This 130 light-year diameter disk encircles a suspected black hole which may be one billion times the mass of our Sun. The disk feeds material to presumably an inner, unresolved accretion disk that is made up of gas entrapped by the black hole. The red blobs near the disk are glowing gas clouds which have been heated up and ionized by the powerful radiation from the active nucleus.

Provider: Hubble Space Telescope | ESA

Image Source: https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/opo9814f/

Curator: ESA/Hubble, Garching bei München, Germany

Image Use Policy: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

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Image Details

Image Type
Observation
Object Name
Centaurus A IRAS 13225-4245 NGC 5128
Subject - Local Universe
Galaxy
Galaxy > Component > Central Black Hole

Color Mapping

  Telescope Spectral Band Wavelength
Hubble (NICMOS) Infrared (Near-IR) 2.2 µm
Hubble (NICMOS) Infrared (Near-IR) 1.6 µm
Hubble (NICMOS) Infrared (Near-IR) 1.1 µm
Spectrum_base
Esahubble_opo9814f_1280
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ID
opo9814f
Subject Category
C.5   C.5.4.6  
Subject Name
Centaurus A, IRAS 13225-4245, NGC 5128
Credits
E.J. Schreier, (STScI) and NASA/ESA
Release Date
1998-05-14T06:00:00
Lightyears
Redshift
Reference Url
https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/opo9814f/
Type
Observation
Image Quality
Distance Notes
Facility
Hubble Space Telescope, Hubble Space Telescope, Hubble Space Telescope
Instrument
NICMOS, NICMOS, NICMOS
Color Assignment
Band
Infrared, Infrared, Infrared
Bandpass
Near-IR, Near-IR, Near-IR
Central Wavelength
2200, 1600, 1100
Start Time
Integration Time
Dataset ID
Notes
Coordinate Frame
Equinox
Reference Value
Reference Dimension
256.0, 256.0
Reference Pixel
Scale
Rotation
Coordinate System Projection:
Quality
FITS Header
Notes
Creator (Curator)
ESA/Hubble
URL
http://www.spacetelescope.org/
Name
Email
Telephone
Address
Karl-Schwarzschild-Strasse 2
City
Garching bei München
State/Province
Postal Code
D-85748
Country
Germany
Rights
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
Publisher
ESA/Hubble
Publisher ID
esahubble
Resource ID
opo9814f
Metadata Date
2003-12-09T17:51:05+01:00
Metadata Version
1.1
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Detailed color mapping information coming soon...

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There is no distance meta data in this image.

 

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