Centaurus A radio galaxy, as seen by ALMA

This new image of the centre of the distinctive galaxy Centaurus A, made with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), shows how the new observatory allows astronomers to see through the opaque dust lanes that obscure the galaxy’s centre, with unprecedented quality. Image credit: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO); ESO/Y. Beletsky

The new ALMA observations, currently in its Early Science phase, shown in a range of green, yellow and orange colors, reveal the position and motion of the clouds of gas in the galaxy.

The observatory has just issued the Call for Proposals for its next cycle of observations, in which the growing telescope will have increased capabilities.

Centaurus A is a massive elliptical radio galaxy — a galaxy which emits strong radio waves — and is the most prominent, as well as by far the nearest, radio galaxy in the sky. Centaurus A has therefore been observed with many different telescopes. Its very luminous centre hosts a supermassive black hole with a mass of about 100 million times that of the Sun.