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June 20, 2019

Discovery of cool, interstellar gas around black hole

An artist's impression of a ring of cool, interstellar gas surrounding the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way. New observations by the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) reveal this structure for the first time.

ALMA is supported in part by the National Science Foundation through an international partnership. Learn more about this discovery in the National Radio Astronomy Observatory news story Cool, nebulous ring around Milky Way’s supermassive black hole. (Date image taken: unknown; date originally posted to NSF Multimedia Gallery: June 20, 2019)

Credit: NRAO/AUI/NSF; S. Dagnello


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