Hubble Spies 8 Green Filaments Lit up by past Quasar Blasts (IMAGE)

ESA/Hubble Information Centre

Hubble Spies 8 Green Filaments Lit up by past Quasar Blasts

Caption

This image shows the winding green filaments observed by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope within eight different galaxies. The ethereal wisps in these images were illuminated, perhaps briefly, by a blast of radiation from a quasar -- a very luminous and compact region that surrounds a supermassive black hole at the center of a galaxy.

Credit

NASA, ESA, Galaxy Zoo Team and W. Keel (University of Alabama, USA)

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