Cosmic jets are jet streams of matter in space, such as gas and hot plasma. Scientists can not yet explain how it arose. Only experts know that they explode in space at the speed of light. A lot of energy is released.
The image was taken near the black hole in the Messier 87 galaxy, which is about 55 million light-years from Earth. This supermassive black hole is 6.5 billion times the mass of our sun. Its diameter is at least 100 billion kilometers.
The gravity around the black hole is so strong that nothing can escape. Not even light. However, astronomers sometimes see cosmic jet streaks from the vicinity of black holes. They may arise around the so-called event horizon: the boundary above which some light can still escape.
With the image, astronomers hope to be able to further investigate how cosmic jets form. It is impossible to know where the plane came from. “But we can investigate how parts of the aircraft accelerate and heat up,” one of the researchers told the British newspaper.
