Around 12 million light-years away, the supermassive black hole of the galaxy Centaurus A is hurling two enormous plasma jets into space at nearly the speed of light. These so-called jets are brighter at their edges than at their center. The reason for this was previously unclear but has now been explained by a team from the Chair of Astronomy at the University of Würzburg. The research is published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

Centaurus A is the closest active galaxy to Earth, and its black hole is about 60 million times as massive as our sun. Precisely because it is so close, astrophysicists can observe its jets in exceptional detail. The galaxy thus serves as a unique laboratory for studying the most extreme conditions in the universe.