A snake-like structure is lurking near our galaxy's supermassive black hole!

A snake-like structure (filament) lurking near our galaxy's supermassive black hole is the latest discovery to tantalize astronomers.

The filament is about 2.3 light years long and curves around to point at the supermassive black hole, called Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*), located in the Galactic center.

--IMAGE: [link to sciencealert.com (secure)]

"With our improved image, we can now follow this filament much closer to the Galaxy's central black hole, and it is now close enough to indicate to us that it must originate there..."

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Excerpts taken from here:

Cosmic filament probes our galaxy's giant black hole
December 20, 2017, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics

Read more at: [link to phys.org (secure)]