A supermassive black hole more than 244 million light years from Earth has been discovered ejecting large quantities of gas into space.
The black hole is located in the galaxy NGC 5548. The Hubble Space Telescope first recorded gas outflows from the black hole in 2013.
Jelle Kaastra of the SRON Netherlands Institute for Space Research managed the most extensive data collection ever made of an active galaxy from 2013 to 2014. Ejection of gas was observed in data collected from several observatories by teams of astronomers from around the globe.
This gas rushed from the center of the galaxy to form a stream radiating from the family of stars. Up to 90 percent of the X-rays emitted from the black hole are absorbed by this material. This stream has only recently crossed into the path between the invisible object and Earth.
"There are other galaxies that show gas streams near a black hole, but they haven't changed their position as dramatically. This is the first time we've seen a stream like this move into the line of sight. We just happened to get lucky," Gerard Kriss of the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI), said.
Similar rivers of gas in other galaxies rarely match the high angle of the event in NGC 5548. This allows scientists a unique opportunity to study the structure created by active black holes throughout the Universe.
A shielding process around supermassive black holes helps accelerate gas streams to super-high velocities. These winds can carry enough force to blow material away from the black holes at the center of most galaxies. This can help shape the formation of these mysterious objects, as well as their family of stars.
"These new winds reach speeds of up to 3,107 miles... per second," Kaastra said.
The galaxy NGC 5548 is a well-studied galaxy, with a brilliant core. This feature is driven by the black hole at its center, with a mass of 65 million stars the size of our sun. Collections of stars like these, exhibiting unusually brilliant centers, are called Seyfert galaxies.
Kriss believes the stream of gas from the black hole is a short-lived phenomenon, and has been occurring for at least three years.
Research into the supermassive black hole in the heart of NGC 5548 could help astronomers learn more about the way these bodies interact with the galaxies they inhabit.
Study of gas outflows from the central black hole in NGC 5548 was profiled in the journal Science.
