The lenticular galaxy NGC 3156 was captured by the Hubble Space Telescope. It is located 73 million light-years from Earth and has been relatively well explored. Scientists have discovered that at its center lies an extremely voracious black hole.
Despite over three decades of operation, the Hubble Space Telescope still conducts scientific observations and provides interesting photos of astronomical objects. In the latter category belongs a photograph presented by the European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA, which shows a seemingly calm space scene.
Lenticular galaxy
The galaxy NGC 3156 in the photo is located 73 million light-years from Earth. It is visible in the sky in the small constellation Sextant. The galaxy belongs to a type astronomers call lenticular galaxies, which refers to the shape of the object.
Lenticular galaxies fall between ellipticals and spiral galaxies, having characteristics of both types. They are connected to spiral galaxies by a central galactic bulge and a large disk surrounding them, which often shows dark spiral-like dust lanes but lacks large spiral arms. In turn, elliptical galaxies have in common that they have mainly old stars and little ongoing star formation.
NGC 3156 has been studied by astronomers in many ways. Both globular clusters (spherical clusters of stars gravitationally bound together) and stars destroyed by the black hole in the center of the galaxy were analyzed. Using Hubble data, stars near the galactic center were compared with other galaxies that had black holes of similar size. NGC 3156 was found to have a higher-than-average percentage of stars consumed by its central supermassive black hole.
The galaxy NGC 3156 in the lens of the Hubble Space TelescopeESA/Hubble & NASA, R. Sharples, S. Kaviraj, W. Keel
photo-source">Main image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, R. Sharples, S. Kaviraj, W. Keel
2023-09-18 19:02:22
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