Japanese scientists have discovered a cluster of quasars, which they have named the “Cosmic Himalayas.” For some strange and still unknown reasons, active black holes are located not where most galaxies are concentrated in the two clusters whose collision led to its formation.
“Cosmic Himalayas”
A group of Japanese astronomers has discovered a cluster of quasars, which they have named the “Cosmic Himalayas.” Scientists found information about it in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and then verified it using the Subaru telescope. It is located 10.8 billion light years away from us in the direction of the constellation Cetus.
But it wasn’t the distance that made the “Cosmic Himalayas” so interesting. In fact, quasars, which are supermassive black holes that actively absorb matter and convert part of it into radiation, should be sought precisely in those areas of the universe that we see as they were shortly after its birth.
Even then, the fall of giant gas and dust clouds onto black holes was rare. And it happened mainly during collisions between galaxies. However, even then, there were 1-2 black holes per several galaxies, which turned into quasars. Until now, their compact cluster consisted of a maximum of five pieces, but in the “Cosmic Himalayas” there are 11 of them.
Strange things
However, it was not the fact that surprised scientists. All quasars are supermassive black holes, and the latter are always located at the centers of galaxies. Therefore, one might expect that most of them in the “Cosmic Himalayas” would be located where there are the most galaxies.
However, a more detailed study showed that there really is a collision between two galaxy clusters there. But their centers are located at a certain distance from each other. Quasars are located somewhere between them, where there are practically no star systems. And current models of galaxy evolution cannot explain this state of affairs.
According to phys.org
