European astronomers has used the newly built LOFAR telescope to obtain high-quality images bubbles of hot gas - "ears" supermassive black hole located in the center of the galaxy M in the constellation of Virgo, and published their article in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

"These images show the vast potential LOFAR, and has opened our eyes to a kind of symbiosis between galaxies, black holes and their environment. Galaxy and black hole in its center live in indissoluble communication with each other - galaxy "feed" black hole matter, and the black hole gives a part of the absorbed energy back into the galaxy" - said the head of the group of astronomers Francesco de Gasperi (Francesco de Gasperin) from the Institute of astrophysics of the max Planck in Garching (Germany).

Gasperin and his colleagues observed a giant elliptical galaxy M radio, checking work of LOFAR telescope and related devices.

According to the astronomers, this M is the largest "star metropolis" in the constellation of Virgo. In the center of this galaxy is a black hole-heavyweight whose mass exceeds sun 6 million times. She daily absorbs huge portion of gas and dust that is comparable to the mass of our planet. Part of this matter vypisyvatsja black hole in the form of Jety - beam heated plasma moving at relativistic speeds.

The authors tried to take pictures with special areas on the disk of the galaxy - the so-called "ears"- where there are a matter emitted by jet black hole. The researchers collected data on the radio emission from M87 at frequencies from 20 to 160 MHz with the help of LOFAR and other radioobservatory, including the North American VLA in the state of new Mexico and the German telescope "Effelsberg" in Bonn.

"It was the first to receive such a high-quality images at such a low frequency. We thought that this cycle of observations will be for us a new challenge, but we did not expect that will provide such a clear image on the first stages of the introduction of LOFAR into operation" - said another author and Director of the LOFAR Heino falcke (Heino Falcke) from the University of Nijmegen (Netherlands).

Astronomers used a number of the images to calculate the age "ears" and the speed at which the matter of these clouds of gas "down" on the disc's native galaxy. It turned out that the gas bubbles very young in the cosmic sense, their age does not exceed 40 million years. This means that the gas in them almost continuously updated, as the Cycling of matter between the galaxy and black hole.

Pictures "ears" black hole and associated scientific data will be published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics. Scientists believe that the image quality can be improved when checking the telescope will be completed.

The project of LOFAR telescope was developed Dutch radio astronomy Institute of ASTRON in the beginning of 90th years of the last century. It is a network of multiple antennas located on the territory of some European countries United in a single radio telescope with area of 300 thousand square meters with the help of high-speed networks and supercomputer. Building LOFAR was officially completed in June 2010, and currently the telescope is currently undergoing a review and adjustment of the equipment.