The South African telescope captures an awe-inspiring image of the radio galaxy.

A stunning new image of South Africa's MeerKAT telescope captures powerful radio broadcasts woven across space.

The radio emissions originate from an enormous rotating black hole at the center of an elliptical galaxy called IC 4296. The energy released by matter falling into the black hole generates two radio jets of high-energy gas on opposite sides of the galaxy - creating what is also known as a double-lobed radio galaxy.

Using the South African Radio Astronomy Observatory's (SARAO) MeerKAT telescope, located in the southwest Karoo region of the country, researchers detected the radio waves from IC 4296, along with other unique cosmic features that may reveal new clues about large radio galaxies, according to a statement from the SARAO.

Recent observations of IC 4296 revealed that the radio jets become unstable as they travel beyond the outer reaches of the galaxy, allowing some of the charged electrons to escape into intergalactic space. These wandering electrons create several weak radio "threads" that appear below the galaxy in the new image.

The MeerKAT radio data - represented by the red-orange colored gas in the composite image - also captures smooth "ribbons" between the bright emission jets and outer lobes located on either side of the galaxy. The radio lobes are due to the interaction of a jet with its surrounding environment. The ribbons fill the channels which the streams have dug in the surrounding gas. Almost a million light-years of IC 4296, the tapes are reached by an intergalactic gas, creating "smoke rings" in the radio lobes, according to the statement.

"Only MeerKAT's unique combination of sensitivity, angular resolution, and dynamic range allowed the discovery of these threads, ribbons, and rings," Jim Condon, lead author of the study from the U.S. National Radio Astronomy Observatory, said in the statement.

The wires, ribbons, and intergalactic rings captured in recent MeerKAT radio data represent a previously unseen combination of cosmic features, according to SARAO's statement.

"Only MeerKAT's unique combination of sensitivity, angular resolution, and dynamic range allowed the discovery of these threads, ribbons, and rings," Jim Condon, lead author of the study from the U.S. National Radio Astronomy Observatory, said in the statement.

The wires, ribbons, and intergalactic rings captured in recent MeerKAT radio data represent a never-before-seen combination of cosmic characteristics, according to SARAO's statement.

The South African MeerKAT radio telescope, which saw its first light in 2018, is a precursor to the Square Kilometre Array (SKA), which aims to answer fundamental astrophysical questions about the nature of objects in the universe with dishes scattered across South Africa and Australia.

"It is clear that new results such as this one from MeerKAT and other SKA pathfinders are prepared to revise our understanding of extragalactic radio sources,' the statement said.