Durham’s space scientists are helping to build the European Extremely Large Telescope. Credit: ESO
Durham's space scientists are helping to build the European Extremely Large Telescope. Credit: ESO - We're at the forefront of research that is furthering our understanding of the universe and the exploration of space. Durham's research spans from black holes to dark matter, planet formation to galaxy evolution and the Cosmic Web that binds the universe together. We also work on building some the biggest and best new telescopes. Our astronomers and cosmologists observe and simulate the universe as we seek to unravel its mysteries. Red or blue quasars? Did you know that the colour of quasars could tell us more about these galactic giants and how their host galaxies evolve? Quasars consist of a supermassive black hole at the centre of galaxies surrounded by a disc of matter that is so bright it outshines the entire galaxy They can be either blue or red, with scientists believing their colour depends on the angle of our line-of-sight. However, we've shown that red quasars are likely to be the result of a brief, but violent phase in galaxy evolution when black holes eject large amounts of energy into the surrounding dust and gas.
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