Galactic Secrets Revealed
Countless galaxies vie for attention in this dazzling image of the Fornax Cluster, some appearing only as pinpricks of light while others dominate the foreground. One of these is the lenticular galaxy NGC 1316. The turbulent past of this much-studied galaxy has left it with a delicate structure of loops, arcs and rings that astronomers have now imaged in greater detail than ever before with the VLT Survey Telescope.
Credit: ESO/A. Grado and L. Limatola
This picture shows the sky around the pair of galaxies NGC 1316 and 1317. It was created from images forming part of the Digitized Sky Survey 2.
Credit: ESO/Digitized Sky Survey 2
The mergers that formed NGC 1316 led to an influx of gas, which fuels an exotic astrophysical object at its centre: a supermassive black hole with a mass roughly 150 million times that of the Sun. As it accretes mass from its surroundings, this cosmic monster produces immensely powerful jets of high-energy particles , that in turn give rise to the characteristic lobes of emission seen at radio wavelengths, making NGC 1316 the fourth-brightest radio source in the sky [2].
NGC 1316 has also been host to four recorded type Ia supernovae, which are vitally important astrophysical events for astronomers. Since type Ia supernovae have a very clearly defined brightness [3], they can be used to measure the distance to the host galaxy; in this case, 60 million light-years. These “standard candles” are much sought-after by astronomers, as they are an excellent tool to reliably measure the distance to remote objects. In fact, they played a key role in the groundbreaking discovery that our Universe is expanding at an accelerating rate.
Credit: ESO/A. Grado & L. Limatola
Credit: ESO/Digitized Sky Survey 2/Nick Risinger (skysurvey.org). Music: Jennifer Athena GalatisNotes:
[1] Lenticular or “lens-shaped” galaxies are an intermediate form between diffuse elliptical galaxies and the better-known spiral galaxies such as the Milky Way.
[2] As this radio source is the brightest in the constellation of Fornax it is also known as Fornax A.
[3] Type Ia Supernovae occur when an accreting white dwarf in a binary star system slowly gains mass from its companion until it reaches a limit that triggers the nuclear fusion of carbon. In a brief period of time, a chain reaction is initiated that eventually ends in a huge release of energy: a supernova explosion. The supernova always occurs at a specific mass, known as the Chandrasekhar limit, and produces an almost identical explosion each time. The similarity of type Ia supernovae allow astronomers to use the cataclysmic events to measure distance.
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