Messier 87
E457106
active galaxy
cD galaxy
elliptical galaxy
giant elliptical galaxy
lenticular-like galaxy
radio galaxy
supermassive black hole
Messier 87 is a giant elliptical galaxy in the Virgo Cluster, notable for its supermassive black hole and powerful relativistic jet.
All labels observed (3)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| M87 | 6 |
| Messier 87 canonical | 6 |
| M87* | 2 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T4648496 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Messier 87 Context triple: [Messier catalogue, contains, Messier 87]
-
A.
Messier 81
Messier 81 is a prominent, nearby grand-design spiral galaxy in the constellation Ursa Major, notable for its brightness and well-defined structure.
-
B.
Paisley Galaxy
Paisley Galaxy is a popular Cantopop song by Hong Kong singer Kelly Chan.
-
C.
Messier 82
Messier 82, also known as the Cigar Galaxy, is a nearby starburst galaxy in Ursa Major undergoing intense star formation and strong galactic winds.
-
D.
Baade X
Baade X is a minor lunar impact crater located near the larger crater Baade on the Moon’s far side.
-
E.
Messier 8
Messier 8, also known as the Lagoon Nebula, is a large, bright emission nebula and active star-forming region visible in the constellation Sagittarius.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Messier 87 Target entity description: Messier 87 is a giant elliptical galaxy in the Virgo Cluster, notable for its supermassive black hole and powerful relativistic jet.
-
A.
Messier 81
Messier 81 is a prominent, nearby grand-design spiral galaxy in the constellation Ursa Major, notable for its brightness and well-defined structure.
-
B.
Paisley Galaxy
Paisley Galaxy is a popular Cantopop song by Hong Kong singer Kelly Chan.
-
C.
Messier 82
Messier 82, also known as the Cigar Galaxy, is a nearby starburst galaxy in Ursa Major undergoing intense star formation and strong galactic winds.
-
D.
Baade X
Baade X is a minor lunar impact crater located near the larger crater Baade on the Moon’s far side.
-
E.
Messier 8
Messier 8, also known as the Lagoon Nebula, is a large, bright emission nebula and active star-forming region visible in the constellation Sagittarius.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (52)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
active galaxy
ⓘ
cD galaxy ⓘ elliptical galaxy ⓘ giant elliptical galaxy ⓘ lenticular-like galaxy ⓘ radio galaxy ⓘ supermassive black hole ⓘ |
| alsoKnownAs |
3C 274
ⓘ
M87 ⓘ
linked to:
NGC 4486
NGC 4486 ⓘ Virgo A ⓘ
linked to:
Virgo Cluster
|
| apparentMagnitudeV | ~8.6 ⓘ |
| catalog |
Messier catalogue
ⓘ
New General Catalogue ⓘ Third Cambridge Catalogue of Radio Sources ⓘ
linked to:
3C catalogue of radio sources
|
| declination | +12° 23′ 28″ ⓘ |
| discoveredBy | Charles Messier ⓘ |
| discoveryYear | 1781 ⓘ |
| distanceFromEarth |
about 16.5 megaparsecs
ⓘ
about 53 million light-years ⓘ |
| dominatesGravitationalPotentialOf | central Virgo Cluster region ⓘ |
| firstImageYear | 2019 ⓘ |
| globularClusterCount | several thousand ⓘ |
| hasDarkMatterHalo | true ⓘ |
| hasFeature |
X-ray emitting hot gas halo
ⓘ
bright active galactic nucleus ⓘ extended stellar halo ⓘ large population of globular clusters ⓘ |
| hasJet | relativistic jet ⓘ |
| hasSupermassiveBlackHole |
M87*
ⓘ
linked to:
NGC 4486
|
| imagedBy | Event Horizon Telescope ⓘ |
| isCentralGalaxyOf |
Virgo A subcluster
ⓘ
linked to:
Virgo Cluster
|
| jetDiscoveredBy |
Heber Curtis
ⓘ
linked to:
Heber Doust Curtis
|
| jetDiscoveryYear | 1918 ⓘ |
| jetLength |
about 5,000 light-years (optical)
ⓘ
tens of thousands of light-years (radio) ⓘ |
| locatedIn |
Messier 87
ⓘ
linked to:
NGC 4486
|
| locatedInConstellation | Virgo ⓘ |
| mass | about 6.5 billion solar masses ⓘ |
| memberOf | Virgo Cluster ⓘ |
| morphologicalType | E0–E1 ⓘ |
| observedBy |
Chandra X-ray Observatory
ⓘ
Hubble Space Telescope ⓘ Very Large Array ⓘ |
| radialVelocity | ~1300 km/s ⓘ |
| radioLoud | true ⓘ |
| radioSourceDesignation |
3C 274
ⓘ
Virgo A ⓘ
linked to:
Virgo Cluster
|
| redshift | ~0.00428 ⓘ |
| rightAscension | 12h 30m 49.4s ⓘ |
| stellarMass | hundreds of billions of solar masses ⓘ |
| XrayEmissionSource | intra-cluster medium ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Messier 87 Description of subject: Messier 87 is a giant elliptical galaxy in the Virgo Cluster, notable for its supermassive black hole and powerful relativistic jet.
Referenced by (14)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
linked to: Messier 87
linked to: Messier 87
linked to: Messier 87
subject linked to:
Virgo constellation
linked to: Messier 87
linked to: Messier 87
linked to: Messier 87
linked to: Messier 87
linked to: Messier 87