NGC 1365 central region

This is an enlargement of an image obtained by FORS1 in the light of H-alpha emission of ionized hydrogen, and here processed to show the central region of NGC1365 in great detail. The star-forming regions in this area show up as knots. The nucleus itself is very bright. An analysis has shown that the matter density in the very central region is very high and there are motions with internal velocities up to about 2000 km/sec. The nucleus probably contains a very massive black hole. North is to the upper right and East is to the upper left.