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First image of Milky Way's black hole

An international astronomy team gave the world its first glimpse of the supermassive black hole at the center of our Milky Way galaxy.

An image of the supermassive black hole called Sagittarius A* at the center of our Milky Way galaxy
An image of the supermassive black hole called Sagittarius A* at the center of our Milky Way galaxy (AN/EHT Collaboration)

An international astronomy team on Thursday gave the world its first glimpse of the supermassive black hole at the center of our Milky Way galaxy — a glowing ring of light with three bright spots and a mass that is 4 million times that of the Sun.

The image of the previously unseeable black hole was captured by the Event Horizon Telescope, an international organization of more than 200 researchers and engineers linking eight major radio observatories on four continents into one virtual, Earth-sized telescope with a profound degree of angular resolution.

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