'This result is a significant challenge to our current understanding of quasar jets,' he added. 'Only this space-Earth system could reveal this temperature, and now we have to figure out how that environment can reach such temperatures,' said RadioAstron project scientist Yuri Kovalev. The researchers were surprised when their Earth-space system revealed a temperature hotter than 10 trillion degrees. Illustration of a black hole in a spiral galaxy shown When the inflow of gas and dust to this black hole reaches a certain level, the event can cause a 'quasar' to form - an extremely bright region as the material swirls around the black hole. That limit, scientists thought, was about 100 billion degrees.Īll galaxies have a supermassive black hole at their cores. Just how bright these emission could be was thought to be limited by physical processes. Quasars like 3C 273 propel huge jets of material outward at speeds nearly that of light, and these powerful jets emit radio waves. The researchers pointed their telescope system at a quasar called 3C 273, more than 2 billion light-years from Earth. Their achievement produced a pair of scientific surprises that promise to advance the understanding of quasars. This led to the highest resolution, or ability to discern fine detail, of any astronomical observation ever made. The team combined the Russian RadioAstron satellite with four ground-based telescopes to produce a virtual radio telescope more than 100,000 miles (161,000km) across. These regions emit huge amounts of electro-magnetic radiation in their jets, and can be a trillion times brighter than the sun.īut they last only 10 to 100 million years on average, making them relatively tough to spot in galaxies that are several billion years old. They are typically 3,260 light-years across.
'Quasar' is short for quasi-stellar radio source, and describes bright centres of galaxies.Īll galaxies have a supermassive black hole at their cores.
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