# James Webb Telescope Captures a Supermassive Black Hole Feeding in Unprecedented Detail

*2026-07-19 06:02 UTC · Science · 1 min read*

> JWST's NIRSpec instrument resolved an 800-light-year gas disk feeding a supermassive black hole in NGC 4696, showing black holes may recycle their own fuel.

Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope have produced the clearest view yet of how a supermassive black hole draws in the gas it needs to grow. The team, led by researchers at Université de Montréal with contributions from Michigan State University, pointed JWST's NIRSpec instrument at NGC 4696, the central galaxy of the Centaurus Cluster, roughly 145 million light-years from Earth.

After nearly eight hours of observation, the spectrograph resolved a vast filament of cool gas funneling directly into an 800-light-year-wide rotating disk around the black hole, with gas racing around at speeds up to 600 kilometers per second. The data traced structures as small as about 30 light-years across, revealing an S-shaped accretion disk fed continuously by the infalling filament.

The findings, published July 14 in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, support the idea that supermassive black holes recycle their own fuel: jets heat surrounding gas, which later cools and falls back inward to feed the black hole again. The result helps resolve a longstanding question about how these galactic engines sustain their growth over cosmic time.

## Sources

- [sciencedaily.com](https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2026/07/260716023601.htm)
- [iopscience.iop.org](https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/ae81ae)

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TechTools News · https://techtools.cz/tools/news/article/2032-james-webb-telescope-captures-a-supermassive-black-hole-feeding-in
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