Bode's Galaxy (M81) and the Cigar Galaxy (M82) were both discovered in 1774 by Johan Bode and are two of the brighter galaxies in the night sky, both able to be seen with a good pair of binoculars or small telescope. Although they were discovered nearly 250 years ago, secrets from this well-studied galactic pair continue to be found!

Bode's Galaxy is about 12 million light years away and has a monster living inside with a supermassive black hole within its nucleus that has a mass roughly 70 million times that of our sun. For reference, the black hole at the center of our Milky Way is about 15 times smaller. Bode's Galaxy definitely rules the neighborhood and is the largest of 34 galaxies that are in the region and all gravitationally interacting. A beautiful example of a "grand design spiral" galaxy, it is also one of the most remote large galaxies known to be moving towards us!

Its companion, M82 (Cigar Galaxy) was originally thought to be an irregular galaxy but we now know that is actually a more typical spiral galaxy with two spiral arms.....we are just seeing it nearly edge on. The central core/nucleus is so incredibly bright as robust star formation is occurring as hydrogen falls into the starburst core. Bode's Galaxy clearly wreaks havoc on it's neighbor with at least one close encounter with the Cigar Galaxy over the past 200 million years resulting in star's being formed at 10 times the normal expected rate within the Cigar Galaxy. Unusual radio waves started being emitted from M82 in 2010 and were detected by radio-astronomers in the UK. Radio waves in and of themselves are not unusual, but this one is without significant associated x-rays which is unlike anything else observed in the universe so far. Whatever this object is, it also has another interesting property in that it is moving towards us at a significant fraction of the speed of light. When measured simply, this can make it appear to be moving faster than the speed of light (apparent supraluminal velocity) which is a little quirk of physics where something can appear to be breaking Einstein's theory of special relativity that prevents mass, energy, or information traveling faster than the speed of light.

Enjoy!