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What happened to that gas cloud that was to be swallowed at Milky Way center

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  • 05-09-2014 7:38pm
    #1
    NGC999888
    Registered Users Posts: 76 ✭✭


    Heard loads about this for about a year. Then suddenly nothing.


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    #2
    ps200306
    Registered Users Posts: 1,613 ✭✭✭ps200306


    I vaguely remember hearing it got swallowed. There were some animations of it getting stretched by tidal forces etc.

    EDIT: Ok, scratch that. Here's the image I was thinking of, just showing different positions over a few years:

    rtKSBzS.png
    Image courtesy of S. Gillessen/ESO

    I looked up Andrea Ghez, the lady who did the fifteen year study of the stars orbiting the Milky Way's supermassive black hole. She has a separate theory that the gas cloud contains a star, whose gravity would stop the cloud getting tidally distorted as quickly. So far she seems to be right.

    Bottom line is it seems we're still waiting.


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