European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - July 11, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Wednesday july 11,1990 the stars and stripes a a a Page 3  v of he Silky Way by the new York times astronomers Are peering deep into the heart of the Milky Way Galaxy and seeing a riotous display of nearly every phenomenon of nature known to science and possibly then some. A a powder a with stars a is How Milton and Many a casual observer of the night sky has looked on the Milky Way. A Majestic pin wheel of 00 billion stars including the Sun and its family of planets is the More informed View of astronomers. The Pii wheel turns on a Hub the galactic Core where the density of stars and huge Clouds of Gas and dust have Long obscured the turbulence within. But now powerful new radio and Infra red telescopes Are giving astronomers a clearer picture of the titanic maelstrom that oils the Galaxy a mysterious Center. There they detect the throb of creation and crush of violent collapse blizzards of intense radiation and cataracts of starry debris plunging into a gravitational abyss. Filaments of Gas stretch in arcs around the Core. Winds of particles strip a giant Star of its outer atmosphere and electrons dance along magnetic lines creating stunning auroras. The Center of the Milky Way a a harbours unusual Phenomena almost the entire galactic zoo a said or Farhad Yusef Zadeh an astronomer at Northwestern University. Even More advanced telescopes Promise to provide further insights into the strange dynamics of the galactic Center. Radiations from Stellar explosions and the annihilation of matter by antimatter Are to be studied by the Gamma Ray Observatory which is to be launched by a space shuttle this november if technical problems with the shuttle Fleet can be resolved. The West German run then satellite or Rosa was launched a month ago and will examine a rays from the mysterious Region. The troubled Hubble space Telescope which primarily observes visible and ultraviolet Light is not intended to address questions about the Core of the Milky Way. A my feeling is we Are close to a it is  n i a. Further observations this fall. Using a Dio telescopes thousands of Mit it amp apart but operated in unison Are expected to produce images a Hundred times More detailed than those released last month. Comparisons of the plasma blobs in Ris a professor of astronomy at the University of California at los an breakthrough said or. Mark a mor fes by Geles. A i think pretty soon within a few years we will piece together a coherent picture of what a going on  Yusef Zadeh Morris and an australian colleague or. Ronald d. Ekers May have already answered one big question that has preoccupied scientists in recent years what lies at the Eye of the maelstrom by examining the intense radiations in radio wavelengths astronomers have suspected the presence of a super dense object a million times As massive As the Sun and yet so compact that it could fit inside the solar system. Is it an extraordinarily crowded clump of massive stars or is it a Black Hole a an object so massive that even Light cannot escape the grip of its tremendous Gravity Yusef Zadeh reported last month that his team had not Only pinpointed the site of the object but had identified it As almost surely a Black Hole. The findings were based on an analysis of the most detailed images Ever obtained of the Milky ways Central Region a images made from observations by the very Large array radio Telescope a Phalanx of 27 dish antennas in the desert near Socorro . Radio Waves pass freely through the dust and Gas that hide the Core from conventional optical telescopes. A we have new pieces of information that make it increasingly Clear that a Black Hole is at the Center of the Galaxy a Yusef Zadeh said in presenting the results at a meeting of the american astronomical society in Albuquerque . The most intriguing evidence he said was the detection of at least seven blobs of Gas that seem to be spiralling out from the massive Center of the Galaxy. The blobs appear to be Large Clouds of plasma very hot electrically Neutral Gas that has been spit out by the Black Hole As it spins rapidly. Although nothing should escape from the Interior of a Black Hole Yusef Zadeh explained the gases and starry debris being sucked in seem to form a spiralling disk like water going Down a Drain. The Black holes Gravity pulls in the material so fast that it produces tremendous heat spinning off pumps of gaseous matter that escape outward. The two sets of pictures should reveal How fast and in what direction they Are moving thereby giving scientists a better understanding of their source and nature. Yusef Zadeh said the recent images also revealed a come like Tail of plasma being blown off a red giant Star irs-7, directly away from the massive object at the Center. The scientists suggested that the object is emitting an enormous amount of Energy that blows out like a cosmic wind As it consumes stars at the rate of about one every 10,000 years. The most Likely explanation for these observations the astronomers said is the presence of a Black Hole. Other astronomers agreed that the results Lent Strong support to the theory that a Black Hole lies at the Center of the Milky Way and probably at the Center of Many of the 100 billion other galaxies estimated to inhabit the universe. By their nature Black holes cannot be seen directly Only inferred by the behaviour of surrounding forces so their existence has yet to be established beyond doubt. Nigel Sharp an astronomer at the National optical astronomy observatories in Tucson who specializes in infrared studies of the Milky Way said a since nearly everyone has been predicting a Black Hole there it would have been More startling to prove that it was something else but it s especially Nice to pin Down where the Black Hole is because that really helps understand and Model the physical conditions around the galactic  other scientists said the new investigations could eventually confirm the existence of Black holes and Lead to an understanding of the forces that Power quasars those Brilliant faraway objects thought to be associated with some galactic centers. No quasar has yet been observed at the Center of this Galaxy scientists Are also getting better views of the Broad bulge of glowing Starlight in the Central Region of the Milky Way. The first Clear panoramic View of it was produced recently from infrared observations by the cosmic background explorer a spacecraft launched last november. But earlier and More narrowly focused observations mainly in radio and infrared wavelengths had already penetrated the bulge and identified More specifically the galactic Core. It ties beyond the Constellation Sagittarius. In particular astronomers detected Strong radio emissions from one single Point that were unlike anything else they had observed in the Galaxy. Or. Kwok Yunglo of the University of Illinois and or. Donald c. Backer of the University of California at Berkeley determined that the radio emissions were coming from a Region so Small by galactic standards that it was probably no larger than Jupiter a orbit around the Sun. This Small object called Sagittarius a became the focus of speculation about a Black Hole. But infrared astronomers had discovered another candidate for the Core object which they called irs-16 or. Gerry  of the California Institute of technology and or. Eric e. Bucklin of Urcla made an infrared Survey of the galactic Center and detected j a Peak of radiation in those wavelengths in the Vicinity of the radio object Sagittarius a. The infrared object was assumed to be a dense clump of stars. Although Yusef Zadeh and his colleagues did not Rule out nearby irs-16 As the Core they said the Stellar winds the flow of plasma Blob and other forces All seemed to be entered on the massive radio object. The scientists said the radio emissions were probably coming from the disk of Gas and Stellar debris swirling so rapidly around the Black Hole As to act As a Dynamo generating powerful magnetic Fields. Energetic particles interacting with the concentrated magnetic Fields would create intense radio radiation and scientists said it should also be producing the most spectacular lightning flashes and auroras one could imagine. A Black Hole not a Star Cluster is Quot the Best Way to explain these Phenomena Quot Morris said. Other observations indicate that the galactic Center is so turbulent that it is constantly changing. Goods of Gas flying away from the Center Are interpreted to mean that a major explosion occurred a million years ago. It takes a Ray of Light 100,000 years to traverse the Galaxy what exploded cannot be determined. Perhaps there have been episodes in which mass accumulated and then exploded in starbursts. Quot ail we can say is there a Strong evidence that things have not always been the same Quot moms said