Celestial hemisphere:  Southern  ·  Constellation: Centaurus (Cen)  ·  Contains:  NGC 5128
NGC 5128 "Centaurus A", Tragoolchitr Jittasaiyapan
NGC 5128 "Centaurus A"
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NGC 5128 "Centaurus A"

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NGC5128 "Centaurus A"

Centaurus A or NGC 5128 is a prominent galaxy in the constellation of Centaurus. At a distance 10–16 million light-years, NGC 5128 is one of the closest radio galaxies to Earth.

The center of the galaxy contains a supermassive black hole with a mass equivalent to 55 million solar masses.

A collision is suspected to be responsible for the intense burst of star formation. Models have suggested that Centaurus A was a large elliptical galaxy which collided and merged with a smaller spiral galaxy.

Image by National Astronomical Research Institute of Thailand, a telescope in Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO) in Chile.

Image reprocessing by T. Jittasaiyapan

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NGC 5128 "Centaurus A", Tragoolchitr Jittasaiyapan