{"id":13574,"date":"2016-12-01T11:54:18","date_gmt":"2016-12-01T16:54:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=13574"},"modified":"2016-12-01T11:54:18","modified_gmt":"2016-12-01T16:54:18","slug":"esahubble-tangled-threads-weave-through-cosmic-oddity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=13574","title":{"rendered":"ESA\/Hubble: Tangled threads weave through cosmic oddity"},"content":{"rendered":"

The latest\u00a0Hubble telescope<\/a>\u00a0finding:<\/p>\n

Tangled threads weave through cosmic oddity <\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

New observations from the NASA\/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have revealed the intricate structure of the galaxy NGC 4696 in greater detail than ever before. The elliptical galaxy is a beautiful cosmic oddity with a bright core wrapped in system of dark, swirling, thread-like filaments.<\/p>\n

\"This<\/a>
This picture, taken by Hubble\u2019s Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3), shows NGC 4696, the largest galaxy in the Centaurus Cluster. The new images taken with Hubble show the dusty filaments surrounding the centre of this huge galaxy in greater detail than ever before. These filaments loop and curl inwards in an intriguing spiral shape, swirling around the supermassive black hole at such a distance that they are dragged into and eventually consumed by the black hole itself. [Larger images<\/a>]<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>NGC 4696 is a member of the Centaurus galaxy cluster<\/a>, a swarm of hundreds of galaxies all sitting together, bound together by gravity, about 150 million light-years from Earth and located in the constellation of Centaurus<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Despite the cluster\u2019s size, NGC 4696 still manages to stand out from its companions \u2014 it is the cluster\u2019s brightest member, known for obvious reasons as the Brightest Cluster Galaxy<\/a> . This puts it in the same category as some of the biggest and brightest galaxies known in the Universe.<\/p>\n