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Description: The most massive hydrogen-cloud -- free of a host galaxy -- discovered to date, found with the MeerKAT Habitat of Galaxies Survey (MeerHOGS), an initiative to exploit the sensitivity and 1-degree field of view of the MeerKAT SKA Precursor to map local large scale structures of the Cosmic Web. This 3D rendering shows the cloud (at center) and its immediate surroundings. The RA-DEC axis is the spatial (X-Y) plane showing what the cloud looks like on the sky. The Vel axis (Z-dimension) shows the velocity or kinematic action of the gas. Typically a "cloud" will have a disk shape with rotation (note the source in the lower right hand corner, that is a rotating disk galaxy); but in the case of the "dark cloud", there is little if any rotation, and is spread out along the spatial axis in a chain of dense concentrations. The central concentration is large enough to be its own galaxy, yet it contains no stars or activity of recent star formation. |
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