By- Srushti sharma
A star near the supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way galaxy originated outside the galaxy
This is the first time a star of extragalactic origin has been found in the vicinity of the supermassive black hole.
Many stars are observed near the supermassive black hole known as Sagittarius A* at the centre of our galaxy.
But the black hole's intense gravity makes the surrounding environment too harsh for stars to form near the black hole.
All the observed stars must have formed somewhere else and migrated toward the black hole. This raises the question, Where did the stars form?
Some of the stars may have come from farther away than previously thought, from completely outside of the Milky Way.
The team used the Subaru Telescope over eight years to observe the star S0-6 located only 0.04 light-years away from Sagittarius A*.
Over its 10 billion year life, S0-6 must have traveled more than 50,000 light-years from outside of the Milky Way to reach the vicinity of Sagittarius A*.
Almost certainly S0-6 traveled much more than 50,000 light-years, slowly spiraling down to the center rather than making a straight shot.