Mysteries of the CMZ

Four things in the Galactic Centre we cannot explain

Each stop is something visible in data we already have, and unexplained. The tour zooms from the whole Central Molecular Zone down to a few thousand au and back out again.

• The MUBLO — a millimetre source a few thousand au across with 150 km/s lines, cold gas, and no counterpart at any other wavelength
• The fluff — red puffy features in the southern Sgr B2 MIRI field
• The smudge — a small extinction patch in Cloud C, maybe forming a star
• The ionized streaks — parallel filaments ordered across the whole CMZ

• Play runs the whole sequence; ‹ › step frame by frame
• Append ?kiosk=true for a clean screen with no controls

Mysteries of the CMZ

Four unexplained things in the Central Molecular Zone: the MUBLO, the fluff, the smudge, and the ionized streaks. Press ▶ to play.