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Zoom Into Black Hole Jet

This video begins with a view of the stars and galaxies in the spring constellation Virgo. We zoom into the giant elliptical galaxy M87, which lies near the center of the Virgo cluster of galaxies. A high-speed jet of hot plasma is buried deep inside the galaxy. A supermassive black hole ejects the jet at nearly the speed of light. This Hubble Space Telescope time-lapse movie captures the movement of the jet over a timespan of 13 years.

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Galaxy M87 Jet (Annotated)

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Last Updated
Mar 28, 2025
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Claire Andreoli
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Greenbelt, Maryland
claire.andreoli@nasa.gov

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