Feeding a galaxy's nuclear black hole

A galactic bar is the approximately linear structure of stars and gas that stretches across the inner regions of some galaxies. The bar stretches from one inner spiral arm, across the nuclear region, to an arm on the other side. Found in about half of spiral galaxies, including the Milky Way, bars are thought to funnel large amounts of gas into the nuclear regions, with profound consequences for the region including bursts of star formation and the rapid growth of the supermassive black hole at ...