Sagittarius A * is the supermassive black maw at the center of our beetleweed , the Milky Way . As calamitous hole go , it is reasonably quiet , which has allowed for an interesting surroundings in its surroundings – for exercise , there are a circle of adept around it . Some of them orbitSagittarius A*in a matter of years , and now investigator have found the first system there with two wiz revolve each other .

The organisation is known as D9 andis part of theS clusterof stars surroundingthe supermassive bleak hole . The stars that get confining to Sagittarius A * belong to this bunch , buta peculiar form of these objects calledG objectswere the subject of studies in this study . They comport like stars but await like clouds of gas and debris . Within the information , researcher find grounds that this curious target was a double star .

“ I thought that my analysis was wrong , but the spectroscopic shape covered about 15 class , and it was clear this detection is indeed the first double star observed in the S cluster , ” Florian Peißker , lead author of the study and a researcher at the University of Cologne , enunciate in astatement . “ shameful holes are not as destructive as we recollect ! ”

Using observations fromESO ’s Very Large Telescope , the team estimates that the two stars are quite young , perhaps around 2.7 million years old . One of the stars is about 2.8 prison term the peck of the Sun and the other is about 0.73 times the pile . They orb each other in around 372 days .

“ The D9 scheme shows clear signs of the presence of gas and dust around the stars , which indicate that it could be a very young astral scheme that must have form in the neck of the woods of the supermassive black hole , ” explained study co - author Michal Zajaček , a research worker at Masaryk University , Czechia , and the University of Cologne .

Clearly , despite their proximity , they are good enough from Sagittarius A * – although that might change . The team estimates that within one million years , the two stars will merge into one due to the gravitative influence of the black pickle .

“ This provides only a brief windowpane on cosmic timescales to observe such a binary scheme — and we succeed ! ” explain study co - author Emma Bordier , a researcher also at the University of Cologne and a former student at ESO .

The team speculates that binary systems such as D9 are perhaps the progenitors of the G objects . These unearthly heavenly bodies might be stars about to merge , or post - merger stars with a lot of remnant fabric around them . The existence of D9 as a system also open another exciting hypothesis here : planets .

“ Our discovery lets us speculate about the presence of satellite , since these are often formed around young stars . It seems plausible that the detection of planets in the Galactic center of attention is just a matter of time , ” concluded Peißker .

The paper is published in the journalNature Communications .