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Antennae Galaxy:
Superbubbles Bespeak Toil and Trouble
This Chandra X-ray image of the Antennae (NGC4038/4039) shows the central regions of two galaxies in collision. The
dozens of bright point-like sources are neutron stars
or black holes pulling gas off nearby stars. The bright
fuzzy patches are superbubbles thousands of light years
in diameter that were produced by the accumulated power
of thousands of supernovas. The remaining glow of X-ray
emission could be due to many faint X-ray sources, or
to clouds of hot gas in the galaxies.
The Antennae Galaxies, about 60 million light years
from Earth in the constellation Corvus, got their
nickname from the wispy antennae-like streams of gas
seen by optical telescopes. These wisps are believed to
have been produced by the collision between the
galaxies that began about 100 million years ago and is
still occurring. Although it is rare for stars to hit
each other during a galactic collision, clouds of dust
and gas do collide . Compression of these clouds can
lead to the rapid birth of millions of stars, and a few
million years later, to thousands of supernovas. The
expanding bubbles of multimillion degree gas produced
by the supernovas can coalesce to form
superbubbles.
| Fast Facts for Antennae: |
| Credit |
NASA/SAO/CXC/G.Fabbiano et al. |
| Scale |
Image is 4 arcmin on a side. |
| Category |
Normal Galaxies & Starburst Galaxies |
| Coordinates (J2000) |
RA 12h 01m 53.70s | Dec -18° 52' 35.5'' |
| Constellation |
Corvus |
| Observation Dates |
December 1, 1999
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| Observation Time |
20 hours |
| Obs. IDs |
315
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| Color Code |
Intensity |
| Instrument |
ACIS |
| Also Known As | NGC 4038, NGC 4039 |
| Distance Estimate |
About 60 million light years |
| Release Date |
August 16, 2000 |
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