• Zoom in on the black hole next door

    T. Lauer / NOAO / NASA / ESA

    A new Hubble Space Telescope image centers on the 100-million-solar-mass black hole at the hub of the neighboring spiral galaxy M31, or the Andromeda Galaxy, one of the few galaxies outside the Milky Way visible to the naked eye and the only other giant galaxy in the Local Group. This is the sharpest visible-light image ever made of the nucleus of an external galaxy.

    By Alan Boyle, Science Editor, NBC News




    The Hubble Space Telescope has captured the best view yet of the Andromeda Galaxy's nucleus — which is actually a double nucleus, thanks to the galaxy's supermassive black hole.

    Andromeda is the nearest spiral galaxy to our own Milky Way, and the only galaxy outside our own that's visible to the naked eye. But it's not easy to see what's going on at the bright center of the spiral. Astronomer Tod Lauer of the National Optical Astronomy Observatory put together several exposures in blue and ultraviolet wavelengths from Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys to produce this ultra-sharp view.

    The inset photograph tells the story: The black hole itself can't be seen, but it's near the center of a compact cluster of blue stars at the center of the inset. That cluster is surrounded by the double nucleus, an elliptical ring of older reddish stars in orbit around the black hole.

    "When the stars are at the farthest point in their orbit they move slower, like cars on a crowded freeway," NASA says in its image advisory. "This gives the illusion of a second nucleus."

    NASA notes that the blue stars in the cluster are no more than 200 million years old, and had to have formed close to where they are now. Such stars wouldn't last long enough to form somewhere else and move inward.

    So how can stars form so deep within the black hole's gravitational field? That's what Lauer and other astronomers are trying to figure out.

    Lauer presented the Hubble observations this week in Austin, Texas, at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society.

    This zoom dives deep into the nucleus of the Andromeda galaxy. Credit: NASA, ESA, and G. Bacon (STScI)

    More from the astronomy meeting:

    Alan Boyle is msnbc.com's science editor. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page, following @b0yle on Twitter and adding the Cosmic Log page to your Google+ presence. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.

  • Astronomers share galactic glories

    NASA / JPL-Caltech / CfA

    A bubbling cauldron of starbirth is highlighted in this new image of the Cygnus X star-forming region from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. The colors indicate different wavelengths of infrared light, ranging from the blue of stars to the red and green of interstellar dust. The stars have blown bubbles, or cavities, in the dust and gas — a violent process that triggers both the death and birth of stars. The brightest, yellow-white regions are warm centers of star formation. Cygnus X is about 4,500 light-years away in the constellation Cygnus, or the Swan.

    By Alan Boyle, Science Editor, NBC News



    It's a great day for the world's great observatories: Astronomers around the world have saved up some of their most groundbreaking images to share during this week's meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Austin, Texas.

    The Chandra X-Ray Observatory and the European Southern Observatory have teamed up to present their view of "El Gordo," a big, fat galaxy cluster weighed down with the mass of 2 quadrillion suns. Meanwhile, the Hubble Space Telescope's science team is showing off pictures of the most distant developing galaxy cluster ever detected, 13.1 billion light-years away.

    Here are a few pictures from some of the world's other top space observatories: NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, which focused on a star-forming region in our Milky Way galaxy known as Cygnus X; NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, which scanned a broad section of the Milky Way; and portraits of the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds, two of the Milky Way's satellite galaxies, courtesy of Spitzer and the European Space Agency's Herschel Space Telescope.

    Stay tuned for more wonders from the AAS meeting as the week wears on — and if you haven't seen it yet, be sure to spread your browser wide and click through our Year in Space Pictures Slideshow.

    NASA / JPL-Caltech / UCLA

    This enormous section of the Milky Way galaxy is a mosaic of images from NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE. The different colors represent specific wavelengths of infrared light: The blue points of light are stars, while green and red represent light mostly emitted by interstellar dust. The constellations Cassiopeia and Cepheus are featured in this 1,000-square degree expanse.

    ESA / NASA / JPL-Caltech / STScI

    This image shows the Large Magellanic Cloud galaxy in infrared light as seen by the European Space Agency's Herschel Space Observatory and NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. In the instruments' combined data, this nearby dwarf galaxy looks like a fiery, circular explosion. Rather than fire, however, those ribbons are actually giant ripples of dust spanning tens or hundreds of light-years. Significant fields of star formation are noticeable in the center, just left of center and at right. The brightest center-left region is called 30 Doradus, or the Tarantula Nebula, for its appearance in visible light.

    ESA / NASA / JPL-Caltech / STScI

    This image shows the Small Magellanic Cloud galaxy in infrared light from the European Space Agency's Herschel Space Observatory and NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. The Large and Small Magellanic Clouds are the two biggest satellite galaxies of our home galaxy, the Milky Way. In this composite view, the irregular distribution of dust in the Small Magellanic Cloud becomes clear. A stream of dust extends to the left in this image, known as the galaxy's "wing," and a bar of star formation appears on the right. The colors indicate different temperatures in the dust that permeates the Cloud.


    Alan Boyle is msnbc.com's science editor. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page, following @b0yle on Twitter and adding the Cosmic Log page to your Google+ presence. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.

  • NASA / JPL-Caltech / WISE Team

    These nine galaxies were observed by NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer. Infrared wavelengths have been translated into colors we can see, with the shortest wavelengths shown in blue and the longest wavelengths in red. The galaxy in the center is NGC 1398, a barred spiral. Clockwise from top left, the other galaxies are M51 (Whirlpool Galaxy), M81 (Bode's Galaxy), M83 (Southern Pinwheel Galaxy), NGC 2403, IC342 (Hidden Galaxy), IC 4895 (Barnard's Galaxy), NGC 5907 (Splinter Galaxy) and NGC 628.

    A gathering of glorious galaxies

    By Alan Boyle, Science Editor, NBC News

    NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, is best-known for making an all-sky survey in search of asteroids, brown dwarfs and perhaps even planets on the edge of our solar system and beyond. But WISE's infrared eyes can also see much more distant objects in a new light. During this week's American Astronomical Society meeting in Boston, the WISE team released pictures of nine glorious galaxies, with infrared wavelengths translated into the visible-light spectrum. In these pictures, the oldest stars look blue. Pockets of newly formed stars have yellow or reddish hues. To learn more about the cosmic menagerie and see bigger versions of the pictures, check out today's news release from the WISE astronomers.

    Still more about WISE:

    You can connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page or following @b0yle on Twitter. Also, give a look to "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.

  • R. Kilgard et al. / Wesleyan / NASA / CXC

    NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory's image of the galaxy M82 shows the result of star formation on overdrive.

    X-ray vision reveals an explosion of stars

    By Alan Boyle, Science Editor, NBC News

    Stars can be seen bursting into existence in this picture of the galaxy M82, captured by NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory. The galaxy is located in the constellation Ursa Major, about 12 million light-years away. This is just about the nearest place where the conditions are similar to those that existed when the universe was young and vibrant with starbirth. M82's star formation rate is tens or even hundreds of times higher than that of a normal galaxy. That may be due to a close encounter with another galaxy — perhaps with M81, its neighbor. A close brush between the two galaxies would have sent a shock wave coursing through M82.

    M82 is seen nearly edge-on in this picture, with the galactic disk crossing from about 10 o'clock to 4 o'clock. Low, medium and high-energy X-rays are colored red, green and blue respectively. So far, eight very bright X-ray sources have been seen to undergo clear changes in brightness, and Chandra's scientists suggest that they mark the locations of black holes that are pulling in material from massive companion stars. The picture was unveiled this week at the American Astronomical Society's winter meeting in Seattle. Check the Chandra X-ray Center's website to learn more.

    Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" our Facebook page, or by following msnbc.com's science editor, Alan Boyle, on Twitter (@boyle).