Explanation:
What's happening at the center of active galaxy 3C 75?
The two bright sources at the center of
this
composite x-ray (blue)/radio
(pink) image are co-orbiting supermassive black holes powering
the giant radio source
3C 75.
Surrounded by multimillion degree
x-ray emitting gas, and
blasting out jets of relativistic particles the
supermassive black holes
are separated by 25,000 light-years.
At the cores of
two merging galaxies in the
Abell 400
galaxy cluster they are some 300 million light-years away.
Astronomers conclude that these two supermassive
black
holes are bound together by gravity in a binary system
in part because
the jets' consistent swept back appearance is most likely due to their
common motion as they speed through the hot cluster gas
at 1200 kilometers per second.
Such spectacular cosmic mergers
are thought to be common in crowded
galaxy cluster environments in the distant universe.
In their final stages the mergers are expected to be intense
sources of gravitational waves.
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