View allAll Photos Tagged chandraxrayobservatory
A new trio of examples of ‘data sonification’ from NASA missions provides a new method to enjoy an arrangement of cosmic objects. Data sonification translates information collected by various NASA missions -- such as the Chandra X-ray Observatory, Hubble Space Telescope, and Spitzer Space Telescope -- into sounds.
The Crab Nebula has been studied by people since it first appeared in Earth's sky in 1054 A.D. Modern telescopes have captured its enduring engine powered by a quickly spinning neutron star that formed when a massive star collapsed. The combination of rapid rotation and a strong magnetic field generates jets of matter and anti-matter flowing away from its poles, and winds outward from its equator. For the translation of these data into sound, which also pans left to right, each wavelength of light has been paired with a different family of instruments. X-rays from Chandra X-ray Observatory (blue and white) are brass, optical light data from Hubble Space Telescope (purple) are strings, and infrared data from Spitzer (pink) can be heard in the woodwinds. In each case, light received towards the top of the image is played as higher pitched notes and brighter light is played louder.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/SAO/K.Arcand, SYSTEM Sounds (M. Russo, A. Santaguida)
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #chandraxrayobservatory #ChandraXRay #cxo #chandra #astronomy #space #astrophysics #nasamarshallspaceflightcenter #solarsystemandbeyond #darkmatter #gravitationallensing #GSFC #GoddardSpaceFlightCenter #goddard #nebula #CrabNebula #HubbleSpaceTelescope #HST #Hubble
This 2002 Chandra image of NGC 6240, a butterfly-shaped galaxy that is the product of the collision of two smaller galaxies, revealed that the central region of the galaxy (inset) contains not one, but two active giant black holes.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/MPE/S.Komossa et al.
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #chandraxrayobservatory #ChandraXRay #cxo #chandra #astronomy #space #astrophysics #nasamarshallspaceflightcenter #solarsystemandbeyond #galaxy #blackhole #supermassiveblackhole
NASA astronaut Kate Rubins, a crew member on the International Space Station's Expedition 28, is seen here taking taking photographs while performing a spacewalk Aug. 19. Behind her in the photograph is the Japanese Kibo lab module.
For more information about the International Space Station, click here.
Dark matter continues to confound astronomers, as NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory demonstrated in 2004 with the detection of an extensive envelope of dark matter around an isolated elliptical galaxy. This discovery conflicts with optical data that suggest a dearth of dark matter around similar galaxies, and raises questions about how galaxies acquire and keep such dark matter halos.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/E.O'Sullivan et al; Optical: Palomar DSS
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #ChandraXrayObservatory #cxo #galaxy
This is a 2003 composite image of Chandra X-ray (blue) and VLA radio (red) observations showing the inner 4,000 light years of a magnetized jet in Centaurus A. Purple regions are bright in both radio and X-ray. The jet originates from the vicinity of the supermassive black hole at the center of the galaxy (lower right hand corner of the image).
The radio observations, taken between 1991 and 2002, showed that the inner portion of the jet is moving away from the center of the galaxy at speeds of about half the speed of light. Most of the X-rays from the jet are produced farther out where the jet stalls as it plows through the gas in the galaxy. The collision of the jet with the galactic gas generates a powerful shock wave that produces the extremely high-energy particles responsible for the X-rays.
Because Centaurus A Jet is relatively nearby at a distance of 11 million light years, this image offers one of the most detailed looks yet at the interaction of a jet with gas in its galaxy. Jets such as the one in Centaurus A Jet are widespread phenomena in the cosmos, and represent one of the primary means for extracting energy from the vicinity of a black hole. Some jets extend over distances of a million light years. They represent a major energy source for the galaxy and are thought to affect the evolution of the host galaxy and its surroundings. The Centaurus A Jet image will help scientists to understand the effects of jets on their environment.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/Bristol U./M. Hardcastle et al.; Radio: NRAO/AUI/NSF/Bristol U./M. Hardcastle
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #chandraxrayobservatory #ChandraXRay #cxo #chandra #astronomy #space #astrophysics #nasamarshallspaceflightcenter #solarsystemandbeyond #galaxy #supermassiveblackhole #blackhole #CentaurusA
The 2002 Chandra image of NGC 1569, a dwarf galaxy 7 million light years from Earth, shows large hot bubbles, or lobes extending above and below a disk of gas along the equator of the galaxy. The 27-hour observation allowed scientists to measure for the first time the concentration of oxygen, neon, magnesium, and silicon in the bubbles and the disk. They found that bubbles contain oxygen equal to the oxygen contained in 3 million suns.
For the last 10 million to 20 million years NGC 1569 has been undergoing a burst of star formation and supernova explosions, perhaps triggered by a collision with a massive gas cloud. The supernovas eject oxygen and other heavy elements at high velocity into the gas in the galaxy, heating it to millions of degrees. Hot gas boils off the gaseous disk of the galaxy to form the bubbles, which expand out of the galaxy at speeds of hundreds of thousands of miles per hour.
Dwarf galaxies are much smaller than ordinary galaxies like our Milky Way. Because of their size, they have relatively low gravity and matter can escape from them more easily. This property, combined with the fact that dwarf galaxies are the most common type of galaxy in the universe, makes them very important in understanding how the universe was seeded with various elements billions of years ago, when galaxies were forming.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/UCSB/C.Martin et al.
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #chandraxrayobservatory #ChandraXRay #cxo #chandra #astronomy #space #astrophysics #nasamarshallspaceflightcenter #solarsystemandbeyond #galaxy #dwarfgalaxy
Beta Ceti is a bright, giant star with a hot corona that radiates about 2,000 times more X-ray power than the Sun. Scientists suspect that this X-ray activity is somehow related to its advanced stage of evolution called core helium burning. During this stage, the core of the star is very hot (more than a hundred million degrees Celsius) and converting helium to carbon via nuclear fusion reactions.
Using the theory of how stars evolve, we can reconstruct the history of Beta Ceti, a star with a mass of about 3 Suns. Over the first billion years of its existence, Beta Ceti was powered by nuclear fusion reactions converting hydrogen to helium in the core.
After the hydrogen in the core was exhausted, the central region of the star contracted until hydrogen gas around the helium core became hot and dense enough for hydrogen fusion reactions to ignite there. This powerful new energy source caused the outer regions of the star to expand greatly and cool. At this point Beta Ceti became a red giant. During the red giant phase, Beta Ceti would have been a very weak X-ray source.
After about 10 million years, the core of the star contracted and heated to more than 100 million degrees, enabling helium fusion reactions to occur there. In this core helium burning stage, which will last 100 million years or more, the overall diameter of the star has shrunk to about 20 times that of the Sun and the surface temperature has increased, so it is no longer a red giant star.
Image credit: NASA/CXC
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #ChandraXrayObservatory #cxo #supernova #supernovaremnant #star
The optical image (left) of Westerlund 1 shows a dense cluster of young stars, several with masses of about 40 suns. Some astronomers speculated that repeated collisions between such massive stars in the cluster might have led to formation of an intermediate-mass black hole, more massive than 100 suns. A search of the cluster with Chandra in 2005 (right) found no evidence for this type of black hole. Instead they found a neutron star (CXO J164710.2-455216), a discovery which may severely limit the range of stellar masses that lead to the formation of stellar black holes.
The neutron star - a dense whirling ball of neutrons about 12 miles in diameter - revealed itself through periodic X-ray pulsations (every 10.6 seconds). A neutron star is left behind after a massive star completes its evolution and goes supernova. Since extremely massive stars evolve more rapidly than less massive ones, and the progenitor of the neutron star has already exploded as a supernova, its mass must have been greater than 40 solar masses.
If such massive stars produce neutron stars, what types of stars produce stellar black holes? Theoretical calculations indicate that extremely massive stars blow off mass so effectively during their lives that they leave neutron stars when they go supernova. The discovery of the neutron star in Westerlund 1 leaves a small window of initial masses - between about 25 and somewhat less than 40 solar masses - for the formation of black holes from the evolution of single massive stars.
Other factors, such as the star's chemical composition, its rotation rate, or whether it is part of a double star system, may play a role in determining whether a massive star leaves behind a neutron star or a black hole. Further searches of young star clusters are needed to solve the mystery of how stellar black holes are produced.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/UCLA/M.Muno et al.
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #ChandraXrayObservatory #cxo #starcluster #neutronstar
3C58 is the remnant of a supernova observed in the year 1181 by Chinese and Japanese astronomers. A long look by Chandra in 2004 showed that the central pulsar - a rapidly rotating neutron star formed in the supernova event - is surrounded by a bright torus of X-ray emission. An X-ray jet erupts in both directions from the center of the torus, and extends over a distance of a few light years. Further out, an intricate web of X-ray loops can be seen.
These features are due to radiation from extremely high-energy particles moving in a magnetic field, and show a strong resemblance to the rings, jets and loops around the Crab pulsar. The 3C58 pulsar, the Crab pulsar, and a growing list of other pulsars provide dramatic proof that strong electromagnetic fields around rapidly rotating neutron stars are powerful generators of both high-energy particles and magnetic fields.
The pulsar in 3C58 can't be seen directly in this image, but its presence has been deduced from an earlier Chandra discovery, and confirmation at radio wavelengths, of rapid (66 millisecond) pulsations. The present observations provide strong evidence that the surface of the 3C58 pulsar has cooled to a temperature of slightly less than a million degrees Celsius.
The relatively "cool" surface temperature was a surprise to astrophysicists, since the standard theory for pulsar cooling predicts a much warmer surface at an age of only 830 years. The cooling of a pulsar is due to collisions between neutrons and other subatomic particles in its ultra dense interior where one teaspoonful of matter can weigh more than a billion tons. These collisions produce neutrinos that carry away energy as they escape from the star.
The speed of the cooling in 3C58 indicates that the interaction between neutrons and protons are not well understood at the extreme conditions in pulsars, or that an exotic form of subatomic matter is present.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/SAO/P.Slane et al.
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #ChandraXrayObservatory #cxo #supernova #supernovaremnant #pulsar
This is a 2000 X-ray image of the elliptical galaxy NGC 0507 by the Chandra X-ray Observatory.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/U. Ohio/T.Statler & S.Diehl
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #ChandraXrayObservatory #cxo #blackhole #supermassiveblackhole
Chandra's 2002 image of the extremely hot galaxy cluster 1E 0657-56 reveals a bow-shaped shock wave toward the right side of the cluster. This feature, thought to be the result of the merger of a smaller group or sub-cluster of galaxies with 1E 0657-56, gives astronomers a rare opportunity to study how clusters grow.
The shock wave appears to have been formed as 70 million degree Celsius gas in the sub-cluster plowed through 100 million degree gas in the main cluster at a speed of about 6 million miles per hour. This motion created a wind that stripped the cooler gas from the sub-cluster, similar to leaves from a tree being blown off in a storm.
The speed, appearance and shape of the sub-cluster indicates that it would have passed through the core of the larger cluster about 150 million years ago. By the time the gravity of the cluster stops the motion of the sub-cluster, it is likely that the cooler gas will have been totally stripped.
1E 0657-56 is of great interest because it is one of the hottest known clusters. Astronomers hope to use this and future observations to determine if the high temperature of the cluster gas is due to shock waves produced by the merger of many sub-clusters.
Image credit: NASA/SAO/CXC/M.Markevitch et al.
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #chandraxrayobservatory #ChandraXRay #cxo #chandra #astronomy #space #astrophysics #nasamarshallspaceflightcenter #solarsystemandbeyond #galaxy #galaxycluster
With a diameter of about 170,000 light years, the galaxy Messier 101 (M101) is a swirling spiral of stars, gas, and dust whose diameter is nearly twice that of our Milky Way Galaxy. Its orientation allows telescopes to see the spiral structure of the galaxy face-on, giving inspiration for its nickname of the Pinwheel Galaxy. M101 is found in the Ursa Major constellation and is at a distance of about 25 million light years from Earth.
This Chandra image of M101 is one of the longest exposures ever obtained of a spiral galaxy in X-rays. The point-like sources include binary star systems containing black holes and neutron stars, and the remains of supernova explosions. Other sources of X-rays include hot gas in the arms of the galaxy and clusters of massive stars. These X-ray observations of M101 will be used to establish a valuable X-ray profile of a galaxy similar to the Milky Way. This will help astronomers better understand the evolutionary paths that produce black holes, and provide a baseline for interpreting the observations of distant galaxies.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/JHU/K.Kuntz et al.
This 2002 image of Jupiter shows concentrations of auroral X-rays near the north and south magnetic poles. While Chandra observed Jupiter for its entire 10-hour rotation, the northern auroral X-rays were discovered to be due to a single 'hot spot' that pulsates with a period of 45 minutes, similar to high-latitude radio pulsations previously detected by NASA's Galileo and Cassini spacecraft.
Although there had been prior detections of X-rays from Jupiter with other X-ray telescopes, no one expected that the sources of the X-rays would be located so near the poles. The X-rays are thought to be produced by energetic oxygen and sulfur ions that are trapped in Jupiter's magnetic field and crash into its atmosphere. Before Chandra's observations, the favored theory held that the ions were mostly coming from regions close to the orbit of Jupiter's moon, Io.
Image credit: NASA/Goddard/University of Arizona/Lockheed Martin
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #chandraxrayobservatory #ChandraXRay #cxo #chandra #astronomy #space #astrophysics #nasamarshallspaceflightcenter #solarsystemandbeyond #jupiter
Researchers have found a galaxy cluster acting like a passenger on what astronomers are calling an "intergalactic highway." The cluster is known as the "Northern Clump" and is located about 690 million light years from Earth. These images show X-ray data from ESA's XMM-Newton and NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, along with optical and infrared data (orange, green, blue), and radio data from the Evolutionary Map of the Universe survey made by the Australian Square Kilometer Array Pathfinder telescope.
Image credit: X-ray: (Chandra: NASA/CXC/Univ. Bonn/A. Veronica et al; XMM-Newton: ESA/XMM-Newton); Optical: DES/DOE/FNAL/DECam/CTIO/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA; Radio: CSIRO/ASKAP/EMU
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #ChandraXrayObservatory #cxo #supernova #supernovaremnant #galaxy #galaxycluster #XMMNewton
This 2005 composite X-ray (blue)/optical (red) image of the object NGC 40 shows hot gas around a dying, Sun-like star. NGC 40 is one of a class of objects called planetary nebulas, so-called because they look like the disk of a planet when viewed with a small telescope.
Planetary nebulas provide a preview of how our Sun may look about five billion years from now when most of its nuclear fusion energy sources will have been used up. The star has puffed off its outer layer to leave behind a smaller, hot star with a surface temperature of about 50,000 degrees Celsius.
Radiation from the hot star heats the ejected matter to about 10,000 degrees to produce the complex and graceful nebula (red) about a light year across. The X-rays in the composite image reveal a shell of multimillion degree gas (blue) that has been compressed and heated by a 2-million-miles-per-hour stellar wind from the dying star.
The discovery of hot X-ray emitting clouds of gas within planetary nebulas such as NGC 40 enables astronomers to study the violent demise of Sun-like stars. By observing many planetary nebulas, astronomers hope to be able to determine whether X-ray-emitting clouds represent a short-lived phase of most dying stars or unusually violent conditions within specific planetary nebulas.
In another 30,000 years or so, NGC 40 will fade away, leaving behind a compact, ultradense white dwarf star about the size of Earth. It is estimated that about one planetary nebula is formed in the Galaxy every year, and that they recycle about one solar mass of helium-enriched material back into the Galaxy per year.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/RIT/J.Kastner & R.Montez.; Optical: NSF/AURA/NOAO/WIYN
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #ChandraXrayObservatory #cxo #nebula #planetarynebula
Astronomers have confirmed the first example of a galaxy cluster where large numbers of stars are being born at its core. Using data from NASA space telescopes and a National Science Foundation radio observatory, researchers have gathered new details about how the most massive black holes in the universe affect their host galaxies.
Galaxy clusters are the largest structures in the cosmos that are held together by gravity, consisting of hundreds or thousands of galaxies embedded in hot gas, as well as invisible dark matter. The largest supermassive black holes known are in galaxies at the centers of these clusters.
For decades, astronomers have looked for galaxy clusters containing rich nurseries of stars in their central galaxies. Instead, they found powerful, giant black holes pumping out energy through jets of high-energy particles and keeping the gas too warm to form many stars.
Now, scientists have compelling evidence for a galaxy cluster where stars are forming at a furious rate, apparently linked to a less effective black hole in its center. In this unique cluster, the jets from the central black hole instead appear to be aiding in the formation of stars. Researchers used new data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and Hubble Space Telescope, and the NSF’s Karl Jansky Very Large Array (VLA) to build on previous observations of this cluster.
The black hole is in the center of a galaxy cluster called the Phoenix Cluster, located about 5.8 billion light years from Earth in the Phoenix Constellation. The large galaxy hosting the black hole is surrounded by hot gas with temperatures of millions of degrees. The mass of this gas, equivalent to trillions of Suns, is several times greater than the combined mass of all the galaxies in the cluster.
This year, NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory celebrates its 20th year in space exploring the extreme universe.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO/G.Schellenberger et al.; Optical:SDSS
More about Chandra's 20th Anniversary
The galaxy UGC 6697, located about 1.5 million light years from the core of the galaxy cluster Abell 1367, is shown here in a 2005 composite X-ray (blue)- optical (red & green) image. The Chandra image reveals a sharp edge on the lower left that is inside the optical edge of the galaxy, and a long tail of X-radiation extending to the upper right beyond the optical galaxy. These features suggest that the density of the hot gas that pervades the cluster is just right - not too high or not too low - to trigger a burst of star formation by compressing clouds of cool gas in the galaxy.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/SAO/CXC/M.Sun et al.; Optical: GOLDMine/G. Gavazzi et al.
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #ChandraXrayObservatory #cxo #supernova #supernovaremnant #galaxy
This is a Chandra X-ray image of the supernovas remnant Cassiopeia A (Cas A) from 1999. The red, green, and blue regions in this Chandra X-ray image of the supernovas remnant Cassiopeia A show where the intensity of low, medium, and high-energy X-rays, respectively, is greatest. The red material on the left outer edge is enriched in iron, whereas the bright greenish white region on the lower left is enriched in silicon and sulfur. In the blue region on the right edge, low and medium energy X-rays have been filtered out by a cloud of dust and gas in the remnant.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/SAO/Rutgers/J.Hughes
The Mouse, a.k.a. G359.23-0.82, gets its name from its appearance in radio images that show a compact snout, a bulbous body, and a remarkable long, narrow, tail that extends for about 55 light years (see radio image below). The image on the left, a composite X-ray (gold) and radio (blue), shows a close-up of the head of the Mouse where a shock wave has formed as the young pulsar plows supersonically through interstellar space.
The X-ray cloud consists of high-energy particles swept back by the pulsar's interaction with the interstellar gas. Near the front of the cloud an intense X-ray source marks the location of the pulsar, estimated to be moving through space at about 1.3 million miles per hour. A cone-shaped cloud of less energetic, radio-wave-emitting particles envelopes the X-ray cloud.
Pulsars are rapidly spinning, highly magnetized, neutron stars. Their formation is associated with the collapse and explosion of a massive star. Most pulsars get accelerated to a high speed by some mechanism - presumably related to the explosion - that is still unknown. Winds of high-energy particles from pulsars create large, magnetized clouds of high-energy particles called pulsar wind nebulas.
A few dozen pulsar wind nebulas are known, including the spectacular Crab Nebula, but none have the Mouse's combination of relatively young age and incredibly rapid motion through interstellar space. In effect, it presents astronomers with a supersonic cosmic wind tunnel that they can use to estimate the speed of the pulsar and to study the effects of the pulsar's motion on its pulsar wind nebula.
These images were taken in 2004.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/SAO/B.Gaensler et al. Radio: NSF/NRAO/VLA
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #ChandraXrayObservatory #cxo #pulsar
When viewed by Chandra in 2002, the galaxy cluster Abell 2597 showed a vast cloud of hot gas with two dark cavities - upper left and lower right - about 100,000 light years from the bright center of the cluster. These so-called ghost cavities are thought to be 100 million-year-old relics of an ancient eruption that originated around a massive black hole in the core of a centrally located galaxy.
Though dim, the ghost cavities are not completely empty. They contain a mixture of very hot gas, high-energy particles, and magnetic fields - otherwise the cavities would have collapsed under the pressure of the surrounding hot gas. As they rise through the hot gas like air bubbles in water, the ghost cavities may transport magnetic fields to the cluster gas from a disk surrounding a giant black hole.
If dozens of these cavities were created over the life of the cluster, they could explain the surprisingly strong magnetic field of the multimillion degree Celsius gas that pervades the cluster. Indeed, there is evidence that the explosion that produced the ghost cavities was not a one-time event. A small, bright radio source near the center of the cluster indicates that a new explosion has occurred recently possibly initiating the formation of new cavities.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/Ohio U/B.McNamara et al.
In honor of St. Patrick's Day, we present this image of comet Tempel 1 as seen by the Chandra X-ray Observatory on June 30, 2005. The comet was bright and condensed. The Chandra data indicate that the X-rays observed from Tempel 1 are primarily due to the interaction between highly charged oxygen ions in the solar wind and neutral gases from the comet. Chandra observed the comet during the collision of NASA's Deep Impact impactor probe with Tempel 1 on July 4, and it will continue to monitor the comet in the upcoming weeks. These observations could provide information about the expansion of the ejected material away from the comet.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/C.Lisse & S.Wolk
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #chandraxrayobservatory #ChandraXRay #cxo #chandra #astronomy #space #astrophysics #nasamarshallspaceflightcenter #solarsystemandbeyond #comet
NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory has given astronomers their most detailed look to date at the X-ray jet blasting out of the nucleus of M87, a giant elliptical galaxy 50 million light years away in the constellation Virgo.
The 2001 X-ray image of the jet reveals an irregular, knotty structure similar to that detected by radio telescopes and the Hubble Space Telescope. At the extreme left of the image, the bright galactic nucleus harboring a supermassive black hole shines. The jet is thought to be produced by strong electromagnetic forces created by matter swirling toward the supermassive black hole. These forces pull gas and magnetic fields away from the black hole along its axis of rotation in a narrow jet. Inside the jet, shock waves produce high-energy electrons that spiral around the magnetic field and radiate by the "synchrotron" process, creating the observed radio, optical and X-ray knots. Synchrotron radiation is caused by high-speed charged particles, such as electrons, emitting radiation as they are accelerated in a magnetic field.
By using the High Energy Transmission Grating (HETG) with the Advanced CCD Imaging Spectrometer (ACIS) detector aboard Chandra, the scientists were able to measure accurately the spectrum, or distribution of the X-rays with energy. This provided strong support for the model where electrons are accelerated to high energies in the knots, radiating X-rays by the synchrotron process.
The spectrum and intensity of the X-rays from the galactic nucleus also indicate that this radiation is not caused by hot gas produced by material falling into the supermassive black hole. Instead, a high-energy, as yet unresolved, outflow close to the black hole may be producing the X-rays by the same synchrotron process that explains the knots in the jet observed by Chandra.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/MIT/H.Marshall et al. Radio: F. Zhou, F.Owen (NRAO), J.Biretta (STScI) Optical: NASA/STScI/UMBC/E.Perlman et al.
A new record for the most distant galaxy cluster has been set using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and other telescopes. This galaxy cluster may have been caught right after birth, a brief, but important stage of evolution never seen before.
The galaxy cluster is called CL J1001+0220 (CL J1001 for short) and is located about 11.1 billion light years from Earth. The discovery of this object pushes back the formation time of galaxy clusters – the largest structures in the Universe held together by gravity – by about 700 million years.
To read the full article, click here.
The galaxy cluster Abell 2029 is composed of thousands of galaxies (optical image, right) enveloped in a gigantic cloud of hot gas (X-ray image, left), and an amount of dark matter equivalent to more than a hundred trillion Suns. At the center of this cluster is an enormous, elliptically shaped galaxy that is thought to have been formed from the mergers of many smaller galaxies.
This 2003 Chandra image shows a smooth increase in the intensity of X-rays all the way into the central galaxy of the cluster. These X-rays are produced by the multimillion degree gas, which is confined to the cluster primarily by the gravity of the dark matter. By precisely measuring the temperature and intensity distribution of the X-rays, astronomers were able to make the best map yet of the distribution of dark matter in the inner region of the galaxy cluster.
The X-ray data imply that the density of dark matter increases smoothly all the way into the central galaxy of the cluster. This discovery agrees with the predictions of cold dark matter models, and is contrary to other dark matter models that predict a leveling off of the amount of dark matter in the center of the cluster.
If Abell 2029 is a representative sample of the universe, these results indicate that 70 to 90 percent of the mass of the universe consists of cold dark matter - mysterious particles left over from the dense early universe that interact with each other and "normal" matter only through gravity. Cold dark matter gets its name from the assumption that cold dark matter particles were moving slowly when galaxies and galaxy clusters began to form. The exact nature of these particles is still unknown.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/UCI/A.Lewis et al. Optical: Pal.Obs. DSS
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #chandraxrayobservatory #ChandraXRay #cxo #chandra #astronomy #space #astrophysics #nasamarshallspaceflightcenter #solarsystemandbeyond #supernova #whitedwarf
This 2001 Chandra X-ray image (inset) shows the central region of the starburst galaxy known as NGC 253 in comparison to the optical view. Chandra detects a proportionally high number of suspected intermediate-size black holes – a recently discovered class of objects. NGC 253 has at least six so-called ultraluminous (very powerful X-ray) point sources, and Chandra shows that four of them are located within about 3,000 light years from the galaxy's core. This relative close distance may imply that the ultraluminous objects -- which are usually found slightly farther out -- are gravitating towards the center of the galaxy.
NGC 253 is a starburst galaxy located some 8 million light years from Earth. Starburst galaxies are regions where stars form and explode at an unusually high rate. Chandra observed NGC 253 with the Advanced CCD Imaging Spectrometer (ACIS) instrument for 3.6 hours on December 16, 1999.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/SAO/CXC, Optical: ESO
The 2002 Chandra image of the Tarantula Nebula gives scientists a close-up view of the drama of star formation and evolution. The Tarantula, also known as 30 Doradus, is in one of the most active star-forming regions in our Local Group of galaxies. Massive stars are producing intense radiation and searing winds of multimillion-degree gas that carve out gigantic super-bubbles in the surrounding gas. Other massive stars have raced through their evolution and exploded catastrophically as supernovas, leaving behind pulsars and expanding remnants that trigger the collapse of giant clouds of dust and gas to form new generations of stars.
30 Doradus is located about 160,000 light years from Earth in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of our Milky Way Galaxy. It allows astronomers to study the details of starbursts - episodes of extremely prolific star formation that play an important role in the evolution of galaxies.
At least 11 extremely massive stars with ages of about 2 million years are detected in the bright star cluster in the center of the primary image (left panel). This crowded region contains many more stars whose X-ray emission is unresolved. The brightest source in this region known as Melnick 34, a 130 solar-mass star located slightly to the lower left of center. On the lower right of this panel is the supernova remnant N157B, with its central pulsar.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/Penn State/L.Townsley et al.
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #chandraxrayobservatory #ChandraXRay #cxo #chandra #astronomy #space #astrophysics #nasamarshallspaceflightcenter #solarsystemandbeyond #TarantulaNebula #nebula
N132D is the remnant of an exploded star in the Large Magellanic Cloud. The 1999 Chandra image shows a highly structured remnant, or shell, of 10-million-degree gas that is 80 light years across. The remnant is thought to be about 3,000 years old. The Large Magellanic Cloud, a companion galaxy to the Milky Way, is 160,000 light years from Earth.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/SAO
The 2002 Chandra image of the twin quasars Q2345+007 A, B shows that they are not identical twins. This means that it is unlikely that they are an optical illusion, rather, they were probably created by merging galaxies.
When galaxies collide, the flow of gas onto the central supermassive black holes of each of the galaxies can be enhanced, resulting in two quasars. The light from the quasar pair started its journey toward Earth 11 billion years ago. Galaxies were about three times closer together then than they are now, so collisions were much more likely.
Quasar pairs that are seen close to one another on the sky and are at the same distance from Earth often turn out to be an illusion as part of a gravitationally lensed system. In these cases, the image of a single quasar has been split into two or more images as its light has been bent and focused on its way to Earth by the gravity of an intervening massive object like a galaxy, or a cluster of galaxies.
Image credit: NASA/SAO/CXC/P.Green et al.
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #chandraxrayobservatory #ChandraXRay #cxo #chandra #astronomy #space #astrophysics #nasamarshallspaceflightcenter #solarsystemandbeyond #quasar
In honor of #BlackFriday, check out this amazing Chandra Black Hole image. The supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way may be producing tiny particles, called neutrinos, that have virtually no mass and carry no electric charge. This Chandra image shows the region around the black hole, known as Sagittarius A*, in low, medium, and high-energy X-rays (red, green, and blue respectively.) Scientists have found a connection to outbursts generated by the black hole and seen by Chandra and other X-ray telescopes with the detection of high-energy neutrinos in an observatory under the South Pole.
The comet-like tail behind the galaxy ESO 137-001 is clearly shown in this 2007 Chandra X-ray Observatory image. The 70,000 light year long tail was created as gas was stripped from ESO 137-001 while it plunges toward the center of Abell 3627, a giant cluster of galaxies.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/MSU/M. Sun et al.; Optical: SOAR (MSU/NOAO/UNC/CNPq-Brazil)/M.Sun et al.
#NASAMarshall #Chandra #NASA #ChandraXrayObservatory #galaxy #galaxycluster
A collection of the 3D objects from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory is now available on a new platform from the Smithsonian Institution. This will allow greater access to these unique 3D models and prints for institutions like libraries and museums as well as the scientific community and individuals in the public.
Chandra's 3D datasets are now included in Voyager, a platform developed by the Smithsonian's Digitization Program Office, which enables datasets to be used as tools for learning and discovery. Viewers can explore these fascinating 3D representations of objects in space alongside a statue of George Washington or a skeleton of an extinct mammoth.
The only requirement to access these 3D models is a smartphone, tablet, or computer that has a current web browser.
Video credit: VR version: VR model: NASA/CXC/Brown Univ./A.Dupuis et al.; Simulation: INAF/S. Ustamujic et al.; X-ray data: NASA/CXC/MSFC/D.Swartz et al.)
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #ChandraXrayObservatory #cxo
The X-ray data from the Chandra X-ray Observatory have revealed a bright central star surrounded by a cloud of multimillion-degree gas in the planetary nebula known as the Cat's Eye. This Chandra image, where the intensity of the X-ray emission is correlated to the brightness of the orange coloring, captures the expulsion of material from a star that is expected to collapse into a white dwarf in a few million years.
This 2008 composite image of Chandra and Hubble Space Telescope data offers astronomers an opportunity to compare where the hotter, X-ray emitting gas appears in relation to the cooler material seen in optical wavelengths.
This year, NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory celebrates its 20th year in space exploring the extreme universe.
Image credit: X-ray/Optical Composite (X-ray: NASA/UIUC/Y.Chu et al., Optical: NASA/HST
More about Chandra's 20th Anniversary
Chandra's 2003 X-ray image (blue) has been combined with Hubble's optical image (red and green) to compose this stunning and revealing picture of the spiral galaxy NGC 3079. Towering filaments consisting of warm (about ten thousand degrees Celsius) and hot (about ten million degrees Celsius) gas blend to create the bright horseshoe-shaped feature near the center.
The correlation of the warm and hot filaments suggests that they were both formed as a superwind of gas -- rushing out from the central regions of the galaxy -- carved a cavity in the cool gas of disk galactic disk. The superwind stripped fragments of gas off the walls of the cavity, stretched them into long filaments, and heated them. The full extent of the superwind shows up as a fainter conical cloud of X-ray emission surrounding the filaments.
A superwind, such as the one in NGC 3079 originates in the center of the galaxy, either from activity generated by a central supermassive black hole, or by a burst of supernova activity. Superwinds are thought to play a key role in the evolution of galaxies by regulating the formation of new stars, and by dispersing heavy elements to the outer parts of the galaxy and beyond. These latest Chandra data indicate that astronomers may be seriously underestimating the mass lost in superwinds and therefore their influence within and around the host galaxy.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/STScI/U.North Carolina/G.Cecil
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #chandraxrayobservatory #ChandraXRay #cxo #chandra #astronomy #space #astrophysics #nasamarshallspaceflightcenter #solarsystemandbeyond #Hubble #HubbleSpaceTelescope #HST #gsfc #Goddard #GoddardSpaceFlightCenter #galaxy
Astronomers may have discovered a new kind of survival story: a star that had a brush with a giant black hole and lived to tell the tale through exclamations of X-rays.
Data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and ESA’s XMM-Newton uncovered the account that began with a red giant star wandering too close to a supermassive black hole in a galaxy about 250 million light years from Earth. The black hole, located in a galaxy called GSN 069, has a mass about 400,000 times that of the Sun, putting it on the small end of the scale for supermassive black holes.
Once the red giant was captured by the black hole’s gravity, the outer layers of the star containing hydrogen were stripped off and careened toward the black hole, leaving the core of the star – known as a white dwarf – behind.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXO/CSIC-INTA/G.Miniutti et al.; Optical: DSS)
"Mini Supernova" Explosion Could Have Big Impact
In Hollywood blockbusters, explosions are often among the stars of the show. In space, explosions of actual stars are a focus for scientists who hope to better understand their births, lives, and deaths and how they interact with their surroundings.
Using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, astronomers have studied one particular explosion that may provide clues to the dynamics of other, much larger stellar eruptions.
A team of researchers pointed the telescope at GK Persei, an object that became a sensation in the astronomical world in 1901 when it suddenly appeared as one of the brightest stars in the sky for a few days, before gradually fading away in brightness. Today, astronomers cite GK Persei as an example of a “classical nova,” an outburst produced by a thermonuclear explosion on the surface of a white dwarf star, the dense remnant of a Sun-like star.
Read Full Article: www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/chandra/mini-supernova-explosion-could-have-big-impact.html
Read more about Chandra:
p.s. You can see all of our Chandra photos in the Chandra Group in Flickr at: www.flickr.com/groups/chandranasa/ We'd love to have you as a member!
_____________________________________________
These official NASA photographs are being made available for publication by news organizations and/or for personal use printing by the subject(s) of the photographs. The photographs may not be used in materials, advertisements, products, or promotions that in any way suggest approval or endorsement by NASA. All Images used must be credited. For information on usage rights please visit: www.nasa.gov/audience/formedia/features/MP_Photo_Guidelin...
This trio of images contains evidence from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory that a clump of stellar material has been jettisoned away from a double star system at incredibly high speeds. This system, known as PSR B1259-63/LS 2883 – or B1259 for short – is comprised of two objects in orbit around one another. The first is a star about 30 times as massive as the Sun that has a disk of material swirling around it. The other is a pulsar, an ultra-dense neutron star left behind when an even more massive star underwent a supernova explosion.
Credits: NASA/CXC/PSU/G.Pavlov et al
Read more about Chandra:
p.s. You can see all of our Chandra photos in the Chandra Group in Flickr at: www.flickr.com/groups/chandranasa/ We'd love to have you as a member!
_____________________________________________
These official NASA photographs are being made available for publication by news organizations and/or for personal use printing by the subject(s) of the photographs. The photographs may not be used in materials, advertisements, products, or promotions that in any way suggest approval or endorsement by NASA. All Images used must be credited. For information on usage rights please visit: www.nasa.gov/audience/formedia/features/MP_Photo_Guidelin...
Since astronomers captured the bright explosion of a star on February 24, 1987, researchers have been searching for the squashed stellar core that should have been left behind. A group of astronomers using data from NASA space missions and ground-based telescopes may have finally found it.
As the first supernova visible with the naked eye in about 400 years, Supernova 1987A (or SN 1987A for short) sparked great excitement among scientists and soon became one of the most studied objects in the sky. The supernova is located in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a small companion galaxy to our own Milky Way, only about 170,000 light-years from Earth.
While astronomers watched debris explode outward from the site of the detonation, they also looked for what should have remained of the star’s core: a neutron star.
Data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and previously unpublished data from NASA’s Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR), in combination with data from the ground-based Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) reported last year, now present an intriguing collection of evidence for the presence of the neutron star at the center of SN 1987A.
Image credit: Chandra (X-ray): NASA/CXC/Univ. di Palermo/E. Greco; Illustration: INAF-Osservatorio Astronomico di Palermo/Salvatore Orlando
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #chandraxrayobservatory #ChandraXRay #cxo #chandra #astronomy #space #astrophysics #nasamarshallspaceflightcenter #solarsystemandbeyond #supernova #neutronstar
These three quasars, discovered at optical wavelengths by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, are 13 billion light years from Earth, making them the most distant known quasars. The X-rays Chandra detected in 2002 were emitted when the universe was only a billion years old, about 7 percent of the present age of the universe.
A surprising result was that the power output and other properties of these quasars are similar to less distant quasars. This indicates that the conditions around these quasars' central supermassive black holes must also be similar, contrary to some theoretical expectations. As astronomer Smita Mathur of Ohio State, who was involved in the research said, "Perhaps the most remarkable thing about them is that they are so absolutely unremarkable."
By various estimates, the supermassive black holes in these quasars weighed in at somewhere between one and 10 billion times the mass of the Sun. The implication is that the black holes put on a lot of weight soon after the galaxies formed.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/PSU/N.Brandt et al.
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #chandraxrayobservatory #ChandraXRay #cxo #chandra #astronomy #space #astrophysics #nasamarshallspaceflightcenter #solarsystemandbeyond #quasar
Supermassive black holes in the universe are like a raucous choir singing in the language of X-rays. When black holes pull in surrounding matter, they let out powerful X-ray bursts. This song of X-rays, coming from a chorus of millions of black holes, fills the entire sky -- a phenomenon astronomers call the cosmic X-ray background.
NASA's Chandra mission has managed to pinpoint many of the so-called active black holes contributing to this X-ray background, but the ones that let out high-energy X-rays -- those with the highest-pitched "voices" -- have remained elusive.
New data from NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array, or NuSTAR, have, for the first time, begun to pinpoint large numbers of the black holes belting out the high-energy X-rays. Or, in astronomer-speak, NuSTAR has made significant progress in resolving the high-energy X-ray background.
To read the full article, click here.
This 2004 montage shows three clusters of bright, young stars in X-ray (blue) and infrared (green) light that lie in the direction of the center of the Galaxy. Like many stars in the disk of the Galaxy, they are difficult, if not impossible, to see with an optical telescope because of interstellar dust that blocks the visible light.
Infrared and X-ray data provide evidence for a large amount of dust and gas along the line of sight to the cluster, DB01-42. Invisible to optical telescopes, it is located near the Galactic Center, about 26,000 light years from Earth. Most of the stars in the image produce infrared radiation from their surfaces which have temperatures of several thousand degrees Celsius. The X-radiation from the two bright X-ray sources near the center of the cluster requires gas with temperatures of millions of degrees.
Such extremely hot gas may be due to the collision of stellar winds from two closely orbiting stars. The two bright X-ray sources in the image are likely close binary stars with high-speed stellar winds. The diffuse X-ray glow could be caused by the combined heating of gas in the cluster by winds from many stars.
The light from the stars in the two clusters, DB00-58 and DB00-6 show much less X-ray and infrared absorption. This lower absorption, which still blocks much of the visible light, indicates that these star clusters are not in the Galactic Center, but are foreground objects. The way in which the X-rays are produced in these clusters is likely to be similar to DB01-42.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/Northwestern U./C.Law & F.Yusef-Zadeh; Infrared: 2MASS/UMass/IPAC-Caltech/NASA/NSF
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #ChandraXrayObservatory #cxo #supernova #supernovaremnant #galaxy #star
The 2002 Chandra image of Arp 270 shows two galaxies about 90 million light years from Earth in the early stage of a merger. The future evolution of these galaxies will be radically changed by the merger as their mutual gravity distorts their shape, and the collision of gas clouds in the galaxies stimulates the formation of new stars.
The hot spots (blue) located where the disks of the galaxies are colliding are thought to be due to the formation of hundreds of thousands of new stars as the two gaseous disks rotate through each other.
These bursts of star formation create many massive stars that generate intense winds of hot gas, and these stars eventually explode as supernovas. This violent activity produces the hot gas clouds that surround the galaxy disks (red).
Astronomers hope to understand more about how supermassive black holes are formed in the centers of galaxies by studying galaxies at different stages in the merging process. These studies will also provide valuable insight as to how our own Milky Way Galaxy formed and evolved.
In the image, red represents low, green intermediate, and blue high-energy (temperature) X-rays.
Image credit: NASA/U. Birmingham/A.Read
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #chandraxrayobservatory #ChandraXRay #cxo #chandra #astronomy #space #astrophysics #nasamarshallspaceflightcenter #solarsystemandbeyond #galaxy
This image is a composite of visible (or optical), radio, and X-ray data of the giant elliptical galaxy, M87. M87 lies at a distance of 60 million light years and is the largest galaxy in the Virgo cluster of galaxies. Bright jets moving at close to the speed of light are seen at all wavelengths coming from the massive black hole at the center of the galaxy. It has also been identified with the strong radio source, Virgo A, and is a powerful source of X-rays as it resides near the center of a hot, X-ray emitting cloud that extends over much of the Virgo cluster. The extended radio emission consists of plumes of fast-moving gas from the jets rising into the X-ray emitting cluster medium. In X-rays, M87 also reveals evidence for a series of outbursts from the central supermassive black hole.
Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/CfA/W. Forman et al.; Radio: NRAO/AUI/NSF/W. Cotton; Optical: NASA/ESA/Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA), and R. Gendler
It’s the cat’s meow! To celebrate its third year of revealing stunning scenes of the cosmos in infrared light, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has “clawed” back the thick, dusty layers of a section within the Cat’s Paw Nebula (NGC 6334). Focusing Webb’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) on a single “toe bean” within this active star-forming region revealed a subset of mini toe beans, which appear to contain young stars shaping the surrounding gas and dust.
Webb’s look at this particular area of the Cat’s Paw Nebula just scratches the surface of the telescope’s three years of groundbreaking science.
Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI
#NASAMarshall #NASA #NASAWebb #JWST #NASAGoddard #astrophysics #NASAChandra #Space #Chandra #Telescope #Universe #nebula
Astronomers have captured a cosmic "hand" hitting a wall. The "hand" is actually a nebula of energy and particles generating by a pulsar. As a blast wave from an exploded star moves through space, it is running into a cloud of gas. This result comes from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory spanning 14 years.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/A. Hobart
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #ChandraXrayObservatory #cxo #supernova #supernovaremnant #pulsar
M82 is a so-called starburst galaxy where stars are forming at rates tens to hundreds of times higher than normal galaxies. NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory sees supernovas that produce expanding bubbles of multimillion-degree gas that extend for millions of light-years away from the galaxy's disk.
Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO; Optical/IR: NASA/ESA/STScI; Image Processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/J. Major
#NASAMarshall #NASA #astrophysics #NASAChandra #Space #Chandra #Telescope #beautiful #space #science #astronomy #galaxy #supernova #Hubble
NGC 1068 is a relatively nearby spiral galaxy containing a black hole at its center that is twice as massive as the Milky Way’s. NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory shows a million-mile-per-hour wind is being driven from NGC 1068’s black hole and lighting up the center of the galaxy in X-rays.
X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO; Optical/IR: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI (HST and JWST); Radio: NSF/NRAO/VLA; Image Processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/J. Schmidt and N. Wolk
#NASAMarshall #NASA #astrophysics #NASAChandra #Space #Chandra #Telescope #beautiful #space #science #astronomy #galaxy #supernova #Hubble #JWST #NASAWebb #NASAHubble
NGC 1068 is a relatively nearby spiral galaxy containing a black hole at its center that is twice as massive as the Milky Way’s. Chandra shows a million-mile-per-hour wind is being driven from NGC 1068’s black hole and lighting up the center of the galaxy in X-rays.
Credit: NASA/CXC/SAO
#NASAMarshall #NASA #astrophysics #NASAChandra #Space #Chandra #Telescope #beautiful #space #science #astronomy #galaxy #SupermassiveBlackHole #BlackHole #galaxy #spiralgalaxy
A powerful collision of galaxy clusters has been captured with NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and Hubble Space Telescope. Like its famous cousin, the so-called Bullet Cluster, this clash of clusters provides striking evidence for dark matter and insight into its properties.
Like the Bullet Cluster, this newly studied cluster, officially known as MACSJ0025.4-1222, shows a clear separation between dark and ordinary matter. This helps answer a crucial question about whether dark matter interacts with itself in ways other than via gravitational forces.
This finding is important because it independently verifies the results found for the Bullet Cluster in 2006. The new results show the Bullet Cluster is not an exception and that the earlier results were not the product of some unknown error.
Credit: X-ray(NASA/CXC/Stanford/S.Allen); Optical/ Lensing(NASA/STScI/UC Santa Barbara/M.Bradac)
Scientists have discovered a star behaving like no other seen before, giving fresh clues about the origin of a new class of mysterious objects. This composite image features a mysterious object, possibly an unusual neutron star or white dwarf, residing near the edge of a supernova remnant. The object, known as ASKAP J1832, has been intriguing astronomers from the Chandra X-ray Observatory and Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder radio telescope with its antics and bizarre behavior.
Astronomers have discovered that ASKAP J1832 cycles in radio wave intensity every 44 minutes. This is thousands of times longer than pulsars, which are rapidly spinning neutron stars that have repeated variations multiple times a second. Using Chandra, the team discovered that the object is also regularly varying in X-rays every 44 minutes. This is the first time such an X-ray signal has been found in a long period radio transient like ASKAP J1832.
Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/ICRAR, Curtin Univ./Z. Wang et al.; Infrared: NASA/JPL/CalTech/IPAC; Radio: SARAO/MeerKAT; Image processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/N. Wolk
#NASAMarshall #NASA #astrophysics #NASAChandra #Space #Chandra #Telescope #Universe #LongPeriodRadioTransients
The expanding remains of a supernova explosion in the Milky Way are shown in this composite image, on the left, of the supernova remnant G1.9+0.3. NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory image obtained in early 2007 is shown in orange and the radio image from NRAO's Very Large Array (VLA) from 1985 is in blue. The difference in size between the two images gives clear evidence for expansion, allowing the time since the original supernova explosion (about 140 years) to be estimated.
This makes the original explosion the most recent supernova in the Galaxy, as measured in Earth's time-frame (referring to when events are observable at Earth). Equivalently, this is the youngest known supernova remnant in the Galaxy (140 years old), easily beating the previous record of about 330 years for Cassiopeia A. The rapid expansion and young age for G1.9+0.3 was recently confirmed by a VLA image obtained in early 2008.The expanding remains of a supernova explosion in the Milky Way are shown in this composite image, on the left, of the supernova remnant G1.9+0.3. NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory image obtained in early 2007 is shown in orange and the radio image from NRAO's Very Large Array (VLA) from 1985 is in blue. The difference in size between the two images gives clear evidence for expansion, allowing the time since the original supernova explosion (about 140 years) to be estimated.
This year, NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory celebrates its 20th year in space exploring the extreme universe.
Credit: -ray (NASA/CXC/NCSU/S.Reynolds et al.); Radio (NSF/NRAO/VLA/Cambridge/D.Green et al.); Infrared (2MASS/UMass/IPAC-Caltech/NASA/NSF/CfA/E.Bressert)