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The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has released a stunning image of the supermassive black hole at the center of the Andromeda galaxy. The photo was taken by the Spitzer Space Telescope, the last mission of NASA’s Great Observatories program, which was launched on August 25, 2003.
According to NASA, Spitzer was the first telescope to detect light from an exoplanet, a planet outside our solar system. It uses a highly sensitive infrared telescope to observe asteroids, comets, planets and distant galaxies.
Coming back to the image shared by NASA, it said that the image shared is a compilation of 11,000 images taken from the retired Spitzer telescope.
In a post shared on Instagram, NASA explained, “When supermassive black holes “eat,” the material heats up just before it collapses, creating incredible light shows — sometimes brighter than an entire galaxy full of stars. But the black hole at the center of Andromeda (one of our closest galactic neighbors) is a “quiet” eater, meaning the little light it emits doesn’t change in brightness much. This suggests it’s eating a small but steady flow of matter, rather than large clumps.”
Users commented on NASA’s photo of the Andromeda galaxy with a mix of curiosity and humour. One questioned whether the image was real or created by AI, another jokingly asked if eating the galaxy would be a “light” snack.
One user wrote, “Is this a real photo or created by AI?”
Some others said, “If I eat the Andromeda Galaxy, would that be considered a “light” snack?”
“This brings me peace,” another user said.
“This is so beautiful,” another user commented.
Meanwhile, on Friday, NASA reassigned a new group of astronauts for its SpaceX Crew-9 mission ahead of its launch in September 2024. Astronaut Nick Hague and Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexander Gorbunov were appointed as commander and mission specialist, respectively, of the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft, which is scheduled to fly on September 24.
Previously announced NASA astronauts Zena Cardman and Stephanie Wilson have been reassigned to future missions, the space administration said in its latest update. The other astronauts, Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams, who blasted off to space on the Starliner spacecraft in June, will return to Earth with Hague and Gorbunov in February 2025.
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