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Central Black Hole in NGC 3147
A Hubble Space Telescope image of the spiral galaxy NGC 3147 appears next to an artist's illustration of the supermassive black hole residing at the galaxy’s core.
The Hubble image shows off the galaxy's sweeping spiral arms, full of young blue stars, pinkish nebulas, and dust in silhouette. However, at the brilliant core of NGC 3147 lurks a monster black hole, weighing about 250 million times the mass of our Sun.
Hubble observations of the black hole demonstrate two of Einstein’s theories of relativity. The reddish-yellow features swirling around the center are the glow of light from gas trapped by the hefty black hole’s powerful gravity. The black hole is embedded deep within its gravitational field, shown by the green grid that illustrates warped space. The gravitational field is so strong that light is struggling to climb out, a principal described in Einstein's theory of general relativity.
Material also is whipping so fast around the black hole that it brightens as it approaches Earth on one side of the disk and gets fainter as it moves away. This effect, called relativistic beaming, was predicted by Einstein's theory of special relativity.
NGC 3147 is located 130 million light-years away in the northern circumpolar constellation Draco the Dragon.
About the Object
- R.A. PositionR.A. PositionRight ascension – analogous to longitude – is one component of an object's position.10:16:53.6
- Dec. PositionDec. PositionDeclination – analogous to latitude – is one component of an object's position.+73:24:02
- ConstellationConstellationOne of 88 recognized regions of the celestial sphere in which the object appears.Draco
- DistanceDistanceThe physical distance from Earth to the astronomical object. Distances within our solar system are usually measured in Astronomical Units (AU). Distances between stars are usually measured in light-years. Interstellar distances can also be measured in parsecs.130 million light-years
- DimensionsDimensionsThe physical size of the object or the apparent angle it subtends on the sky.Image is 2.2 arcmin across (about 83,000 light-years)
About the Data
- Data DescriptionData DescriptionProposal: A description of the observations, their scientific justification, and the links to the data available in the science archive.
Science Team: The astronomers who planned the observations and analyzed the data. "PI" refers to the Principal Investigator.The HST observations include those from programs 15145 (A. Riess) - InstrumentInstrumentThe science instrument used to produce the data.WFC3/UVIS; WFC3/IR
- Exposure DatesExposure DatesThe date(s) that the telescope made its observations and the total exposure time.Oct 2017 - Mar 2018
- FiltersFiltersThe camera filters that were used in the science observations.F555W, F814W, F160W
- Object NameObject NameA name or catalog number that astronomers use to identify an astronomical object.NGC 3147
- Object DescriptionObject DescriptionThe type of astronomical object.Spiral Galaxy
- Release DateJuly 11, 2019
- Science ReleaseHubble Uncovers Black Hole Disk that Shouldn’t Exist
- Credit
These images are a composite of separate exposures acquired by the WFC3 instrument on the Hubble Space Telescope. Several filters were used to sample narrow wavelength ranges. The color results from assigning different hues (colors) to each monochromatic (grayscale) image associated with an individual filter. In this case, the assigned colors are: Blue: F555W Green: F814W Red: F160W
Related Images & Videos
Spiral Galaxy NGC 3147
Hubble Probes the Black Hole Inside a Majestic Spiral Galaxy The graceful, winding arms of the majestic spiral galaxy NGC 3147 appear like a grand spiral staircase sweeping through space in this Hubble Space Telescope image. They are actually long lanes of young blue stars,...
Artist's Illustration of Black Hole in NGC 3147
This is an artist's illustration of the supermassive black hole residing at the core of spiral galaxy NGC 3147. Hubble observations of the black hole in galaxy NGC 3147 demonstrate two of Einstein's theories of relativity. In the artist's illustration of the galaxy, the...
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Claire Andreoli
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Greenbelt, Maryland
claire.andreoli@nasa.gov
