Type

Supermassive

Location

in the constellation Cetus

Finder Chart

Distance

216 million light-years (67 megaparsecs)

Mass

Unknown 0 times the mass of the Sun

Size

Unknown

Discovery Methods

• Detection of a jet
• Measuring the motions of stars

NGC 541

A "jet" of charged particles squirts into space from NGC 541, an elliptical galaxy near the lower right of this image. The jet, which shows up in observations with radio telescopes, is ramming into a giant cloud of gas and dust known as Minkowski's Object (small blue blob to the left of the galaxy). The collision seems to be triggering the birth of new stars.

A false-color image shows the "jet" from the black hole as red, with Minkowski's Object in blue. The small orange dots are background galaxies.

This document was last modified: March 15, 2012.