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Post Info TOPIC: Fornax A
Blobrana


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Fornax A
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A portrait of two supernovae that exploded just five months apart in the same galaxy has been made by NASA's Swift telescope.

The galaxy, called NGC 1316, has now produced four supernovae in 26 years, the highest rate ever measured.. All four supernovae were of type Ia, which are thought to occur when a stellar ember called a white dwarf collects too much matter from a companion star, igniting a runaway nuclear reaction that tears the white dwarf apart. The supernovae were both initially detected from the ground by an amateur astronomer in South Africa named Berto Monard. Swift was then called upon to make observations at ultraviolet and X-ray wavelengths.
The first event was detected on 19 June 2006 and appears as a yellowish spot on the right. The second event was detected on 5 November, and appears as another spot at mid-left.

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Blobrana


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The Fornax A radio lobes span over one million light years.

In the centre is a large but peculiar elliptical galaxy named NGC 1316.
Detailed inspection of the NGC 1316 system indicates that it began absorbing a small neighbouring galaxy about 100 million years ago.

NGC 1316 is located 53 million light-years away in the constellation Fornax.
Gas from the galactic collision has fallen inward toward the massive central black hole, with friction heating the gas to 10 million degrees.


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Position: RA = 3H 22M 41.8S , DEC = -37D 12' 29.8"

Two oppositely pointed fast moving jets of particles then emerge from the poles of the central black hole, that eventually smash into the ambient material on either side of the giant elliptical galaxy.
The result is a huge reservoir of hot gas that emits radio waves, observed as the orange (false-colour) radio lobes in the image.
The radio image is superposed on an optical survey image of the same part of the sky. Strange patterns in the radio lobes likely indicate slight changes in the directions of the jets.











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