New Delhi: The Hubble Space Telescope has captured a spectacular image of an elliptical spiral galaxy designated as Messier 105. The observations indicate that the stars in the central region of the galaxy are moving rapidly, as they circle around the supermassive black hole lurking within the core of the galaxy. The central supermassive black hole is estimated to contain as much mass as 200 million Suns. The galaxy is at a distance of 30 million lightyears in the constellation of Leo.

Messier 105 has an active galactic nuclei, or an AGN. The central supermassive black hole is actively feeding, in that it is consuming gas and dust from the galaxy, the raw material for star formation, along with the occasional wayward star system. The infalling matter swirls in a disc of tortured material, with the extreme friction causing the material to glow in frequencies across the electromagnetic spectrum. At times, AGNs can outshine all the stars in the surrounding galaxy.

Surprising discovery of active star formation

The astronomers were surprised to discover relatively young stars as well as clusters in Messier 105. The galaxy was thought to be dead and incapable of producing new stars. The galaxy is estimated to be forming one Sun-like star approximately every 10,000 years. Astronomers also spotted ongoing star formation in a vast ring of hydrogen gas that encircles both Messier 105, and its neighbour, the lenticular galaxy with the designation of NGC 3384.

A signature of Hubble

Like most images of galaxies captured by Hubble, the target is sitting in a field of even more distant galaxies of all shapes and sizes, some of which are interacting. A few of the foreground stars have cross-shaped diffraction spikes, a signature of the Hubble Space Telescope that appears only over the most intense and concentrated sources of light. These diffraction spikes are caused by light from the distant sources interacting with the internal support structure of the telescope.