Astronomers have discovered the first confirmed microblazar in the Milky Way, a black-hole-powered system that produces a jet of plasma traveling at nearly the speed of light. 

The system, IRAS 18293−0941, is about 12,000 light-years away and consists of a black hole orbiting a massive companion star once every 11 days while pulling material from the star. 

Some of the material falling toward the black hole is redirected into powerful jets, and astronomers determined that one of these jets is pointed almost directly toward Earth, making the object a “microblazar.” 

Microblazars are essentially smaller versions of blazars, which are powered by supermassive black holes at the centers of distant galaxies, but scientists had previously found no confirmed example in our own galaxy, Space.com has reported.

The discovery gives astronomers a nearby laboratory for studying how black holes launch relativistic jets and could help explain similar phenomena produced by much larger black holes throughout the universe.