MAIL ONLINE: The biggest belches in the universe: Researchers pinpoint cause of 'indigestion' in supermassive black hole

Description

Every so often, a supermassive black hole at the center of a galaxy 25 million light years away lets out a belch of ‘galactic proportions,’ spewing matter into the surrounding space.

Scientists have suspected the phenomenon occurs as the result of ‘force-feeding,’ as a small galaxy falls within the outer reaches of a larger galaxy nearby, forcing material onto the black hole until it can no longer ‘digest’ properly.

New high-resolution images have now revealed a detailed look at how these blasts occur and spread, as the accretion process breaks down to send a shock wave of matter into the interstellar medium.