Herschel’s view of the Galactic Centre

The centre of our Galaxy, the Milky Way, about 25 000 light-years away, as seen seen by ESA’s Herschel space observatory.

Clouds of gas and dust appear distributed along a giant, twisted ring, over 600 light-years wide, which encompasses the supermassive black hole sitting at the Galaxy’s core.

The image is a composite of the wavelengths of 70 microns (blue), 160 microns (green) and 350 microns (red).

Acknowledgement: G. Li Causi, IAPS/INAF, Italy