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Universe of the Hubble Space Telescope 2000 Calendar

Centaurus A is a powerful radio galaxy located some 13 million light years away toward the constellation Centaurus. Radio galaxies are usually giant elliptical galaxies that have been disrupted by recent collisions with smaller companion galaxies. The very center of Centaurus A harbors a massive black hole, which fuels powerful jets of material that are thrown out of the nucleus at speeds of up to 1% the speed of light. These jets produce great quantities of radio and X-ray emission. The compact blue objects sprinkled across the image are clusters of newly formed stars, and the dark bands that run diagonally across the image are filaments of dust that obscure the orange background light of glowing gas.