Astronomy Picture of the Day

Explanation: What created the dust disk in the center of NGC 7052, and what keeps it spinning? Although the disk might appear as a relatively tame "hubcap in space", the unusual center of elliptical galaxy NGC 7052 is probably the remnant of a titanic collision between galaxies. What's more, the disk's spin indicates the tremendous gravity of a massive central black hole. Analysis of this recently released photo by the Hubble Space Telescope indicates that the disk is thousands of light-years across, rotates faster than 100 kilometers per second, and contains more mass than a million Suns. The theorized central black hole is thought to be yet 100 times more massive, and may swallow the entire disk in the next few million years.

是什麼造成了NGC 7052中心的塵埃盤，又是什麼讓它一直在旋轉？ 儘管塵埃盤可能看起來像一個相對無害的 "太空輪蓋"，但橢圓星系NGC 7052的不尋常中心，可能是星系間巨大碰撞的孑遺物。 更重要的是，這個圓盤的旋轉指出一個龐大中央黑洞在施加巨大的引力。 分析哈伯太空望遠鏡最近發布的這張照片之成果顯示，這個圓盤寬數千光年，旋轉速率超過每秒100公里，所擁有的質量超過一百萬個太陽。 理論認為應存在的中央黑洞，其質量咸認是塵埃盤的100倍之多，並可能在未來幾百萬年內吞噬整個圓盤。