Alternate Names

Markarian 766

Type

Supermassive

Location

in the constellation Coma Berenices

Distance

170 million light-years (98 megaparsecs)

Mass

20 million times the mass of the Sun

Size

Diameter roughly the size of the orbit of Mercury

Discovery Methods

• Detection of an accretion disk
• Measuring the motions of gas

Artist's concept of the XMM-Newton space telescope, which has made extensive observations of NGC 4253. [ESA/D.Ducros]

This document was last modified: May 11, 2012.