Scientists discover a mysterious object that doesn’t fit anywhere in the galaxy at the center of our Milky Way
Scientists have discovered a mysterious object at the center of our Milky Way that doesn’t meet the criteria of anything else in the Milky Way.
The team found that the object emits microwaves, indicating that it contains dust and fast-moving gas almost 180,000 kilometers per hour from a very small area in the heart of our Milky Way.
Astronomers considered a range of options for what the object might be, from a black hole to a collapsing cloud and an evolved star, but found that “its characteristics do not match well with those of any known type of astronomical body.”
The team found that the object emits microwaves, indicating that it contains dust and fast-moving gas. The gas was detected at a speed of almost 180,000 kilometers per hour from a very small area in the heart of our Milky Way
“The center of our Milky Way contains billions of stars, tens of millions of solar masses of gas, a supermassive black hole, one-tenth of our Milky Way’s ongoing star formation, and a vast graveyard of stellar remains,” researchers shared in the study published in the Astrophysical diary letters.
‘It is therefore the most likely place to find new classes of objects. We present such an object in this work.
The object, labeled G0.02467β0.0727, was discovered using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) observatory in Chile.
‘We consider several explanations for the Millimeter Ultra-Broad Line Object (MUBLO), including protostellar outflow, explosive outflow, collapsing cloud, evolved star, stellar merger, high-velocity compact cloud, intermediate-mass black hole and background galaxy,’ team wrote .
“Most of these conceptual models are inconsistent with or do not fully explain the data.”
The object was observed while the team at ALMA was studying a special region at the center of our Milky Way known as the central molecular zone (CMZ).
The CMZ, about 700 light-years across, contains nearly 80 percent of all the dense gas in the Milky Way and is home to giant molecular clouds and massive star-forming clusters that are still poorly understood.
Astronomers detected millimeter waves coming from the object, with the surrounding dust showing broad, scattered signals.
The object also emitted continuous radiation, which appeared to emanate from the dust and emitted specific signals from certain molecules such as carbon monosulfide and sulfur monoxide.
Carbon monosulfide has been detected in molecular clouds and sulfur monoxide has been observed around Io, one of Jupiter’s moons.
Scientists have discovered a mysterious object at the center of our Milky Way that doesn’t meet the criteria of anything else in our universe
The object, labeled G0.02467β0.0727, was discovered using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) observatory in Chile, which also detected the microwaves racing through space
The temperature of the gas was around -436 degrees Fahrenheit, much colder than what is typically observed in this part of the Milky Way.
Research also found that the gas molecules do not travel in a simple ring, suggesting they could flow away from an exploding star. Nature.
However, shock waves create specific chemicals that MUBLO lacks.
Researchers said the most plausible explanations would be an intermediate-mass black hole or a pair of merging stars obscured by dust.
But they also noted that the object does not meet either definition.
βThe MUBLO is currently an observationally unique object,β the team concluded in the study.