Gas Cloud G2 Getting Ripped Apart By The Black Hole In The Center Of Our Milky Way Galaxy
Wednesday, July 17, 2013 - 09:40
in Astronomy & Space
In 2011 the Very Large Telescope (VLT) discovered a gas cloud with several times the mass of the Earth accelerating towards the black hole at the center of the Milky Way. The cloud is now so stretched that its front part has passed the closest point and is traveling away from the black hole at more than 10 million km/h, whilst the tail is still falling towards it.The black hole at the center of the Milky Way, known as Sgr A* (pronounced Sagittarius A star), is estimated to have a mass of about four million times that of the Sun and is the closest supermassive black hole known - so it is the best place to study black holes in detail.read more