Page 37 - Curriculum Visions Dynamic Book

 This is the black hole-powered core of a nearby active galaxy 13 million light-years away in the southern constellation Circinus. These active galactic nuclei have the ability to remove gas from the centers of their galaxies by blowing it out into space at phenomenal speeds.
At the center of the starburst the black hole and its accretion disk are expelling gas out of the galaxy’s disk and into its halo (the region above and below the disk). The detailed structure of this gas is seen as magenta-coloured streamers extending toward the top of the image.
 Black holes are not far away. This diagram shows the path of a black hole believed to be within the Milky Way Galaxy. The Sun’s orbit is indicated for comparison, showing that at some time the orbits may well come quite close. The black hole is moving at 400,000 kilometres an hour.
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