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Astronomers have gotten their best view yet of the magnetic fields around the gargantuan black hole at the center of the Milky Way.
A new image reveals that the behemoth, named Sagittarius A*, is encircled by highly-ordered magnetic structures, researchers report in two papers published March 27 in the Astrophysical Journal Letters. The features are similar to ones previously seen surrounding the galaxy M87’s supermassive black hole (SN: 3/24/21).
Using the Event Horizon Telescope, a global collection of radio telescopes working in tandem, scientists captured polarized light coming from around Sagittarius A*, which lies about 27,000 light-years from Earth (SN: 4/10/19). Polarized light has waves that wiggle in the same direction, such as up and down or left and right. Mapping such light often gives astronomers insights into underlying magnetic phenomena.
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