Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Draco (Dra)
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Quasar J15173777+5950201 in the constellation of Draco DeepField, Phil Swift
Quasar J15173777+5950201 in the constellation of Draco DeepField, Phil Swift

Quasar J15173777+5950201 in the constellation of Draco DeepField

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Quasar J15173777+5950201 in the constellation of Draco DeepField, Phil Swift
Quasar J15173777+5950201 in the constellation of Draco DeepField, Phil Swift

Quasar J15173777+5950201 in the constellation of Draco DeepField

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Description

  • The quasar itself is an extremely luminous active galactic nucleus. It is sometimes known as a quasi-stellar object, abbreviated QSO. The emission from an AGN is powered by a supermassive black hole with a mass ranging from millions to tens of billions of solar masses, surrounded by a gaseous accretion disc.
  • The quasar was about 4.6 billon light years away from us when the light we now see was emitted.
  • The light has travelled around 12.5 billion light years to reach us now and it is a few of these photons that I captured in this image.
  • Due to the expansion of the universe, this means that the quasar is now 25.5 billion light years away.
  • The photons captured by the chip in my camera have travelled 12.5 billion light years.
  • They have not interacted with anything, dust, gas, galaxies, stars, they even made it through our atmosphere and into my camera.
  • They started their journey 1.4 billion light years after the Big Bang so they are 90% of the  age of the universe.
  • These photons started their journey 8 billion years before our solar system was even a cloud of condensing gas, let alone the Sun and planets we see today.

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Quasar J15173777+5950201 in the constellation of Draco DeepField, Phil Swift