Astronomers have discovered a star travelling at more than six million kilometres per hour through the Milky Way after being flung from the centre of the galaxy by a supermassive black hole. But where did it come from and why is it expected to leave the our galaxy for good in 100 million years?
An international team of scientists has found a star travelling at more than six million kilometres per hour through our galaxy.
The discovery was made as part of the Southern Stellar Streams Spectroscopic Survey, led by Dr Sergey Koposov from Carengie Mellon University in the United States, and made up of astronomers from Australia, the United Kingdom, the U-S, and Chile.
Emeritus Professor Gary Da Costa, from A-N-U's Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics, was part of the team.
He says the star was located by accident while observing stellar streams - remnants of small galaxies orbiting the Milky Way.
"He predicted that if we discovered stars like this one travelling at very high velocities, it would be evidence that there was a black hole in the centre of the galaxy. So this actually is very nice confirmation of that theory that was first posulated almost 30 years ago."
