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Galactic Center:
NASA's Great Observatories Examine the Galactic Center Region
NASA's Great Observatories Examine the Galactic Center Region
A view of the turbulent heart of our Milky Way galaxy.
About 26,000 light years from Earth.
By combining X-ray data from Chandra with near-infrared data from Hubble and infrared data from Spitzer.
The entire image width covers about one-half a degree, about the same angular width as the full moon.
Blue and violet represents the X-ray observations, yellow represents the near-infrared, and red represents the infrared.
In the Zodiac constellation Sagittarius (archer), visible from both hemispheres.
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- A new image of the center of the Milky Way combines data from NASA's three Great Observatories.
- In this image, X-rays from Chandra are blue and violet, near-infrared emission from Hubble is yellow, and Spitzer's infrared data are red.
- Large prints of this image were distributed to some 150 U.S. planetariums, science centers and others as part of the International Year of Astronomy 2009 activities.
In celebration of the International Year of Astronomy 2009, NASA's Great Observatories -- the Hubble Space Telescope, the Spitzer Space Telescope, and the Chandra X-ray Observatory -- have collaborated to produce an unprecedented image of the central region of our Milky Way galaxy.
In this spectacular image, observations using infrared light and X-ray light see through the obscuring dust and reveal the intense activity near the galactic core. Note that the center of the galaxy is located within the bright white region to the right of and just below the middle of the image (labeled Sagitarrius A when you roll your mouse over the above composite image). The entire image width covers about one-half a degree, about the same angular width as the full moon.
Each telescope's contribution is presented in a different color:
- Yellow represents the near-infrared observations of Hubble. They outline the energetic regions where stars are being born as well as reveal hundreds of thousands of stars.
- Red represents the infrared observations of Spitzer. The radiation and winds from stars create glowing dust clouds that exhibit complex structures from compact, spherical globules to long, stringy filaments.
- Blue and violet represents the X-ray observations of Chandra. X-rays
are emitted by gas heated to millions of degrees by stellar explosions
and by outflows from the supermassive black hole in the galaxy's
center. The bright blue blob on the left side of the full field image
is emission from a double star system containing either a neutron star or a black hole.
When these views are brought together, this composite image provides one of the most detailed views ever of our galaxy's mysterious core.
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Revised: November 10, 2009
Visitor Comments (14)
Wonderful and attractive pictures.
Posted by RAKESH B KASANGERI on Monday, 11.23.09 @ 06:08am
Amazing, you folks are doing a great job to humanity.
One question - if this is what it looked like so many light years ago, how do we know what's happening now?
Will we ever know?
Posted by Madhu on Monday, 11.23.09 @ 04:52am
This is an awesome picture. I've seen the infrared galaxy core pic before, but I've never seen the x-ray infrared and visible all combined. There should be a picture of the core in ultraviolet to add to this also.
Posted by True Radiant Free emissary on Sunday, 11.15.09 @ 16:32pm
What a wonderful. And I guess, If this is only the center of the milky way and our planet is more little, What a little we are in this universe.
Posted by Lizeddy on Sunday, 11.15.09 @ 12:18pm
A wonderful composite image. The detail is very fine. I wonder if it is possible to detect the disturbance in dust and gas, made of objects passing through them?
Posted by Mark Ballington on Saturday, 11.14.09 @ 04:41am
Dear Paul,
The stars visible in the galactic center image are moving in various orbits around the supermassive black hole. In terms of galactic motion the black hole is effectively stationary, while out here in the solar system - in the galaxy suburbs - we're swinging around the center of the galaxy as the arms rotate.
P. Edmonds for CXC
Posted by P. Edmonds on Friday, 11.13.09 @ 08:44am
Absolutely outstanding pictures, thank you so much for allowing me to see.
Posted by Gordon Musson on Friday, 11.13.09 @ 05:10am
WOW. I'm sorry, no other words describe it.
Posted by Michele on Thursday, 11.12.09 @ 22:34pm
What a beautiful picture.
I read a while back a book on our galaxy and it said that the black hole in the center of our galaxy is four light years in diameter and the closest stars to it travel around it at 200 miles per second. This has also been stated in various astronomy programs on Cable Television
Thanks so much to the Chandra team for their hard work to educate us lay people about our most marvelous universe.
Marvin L. S.
Posted by Marvin L. S. on Thursday, 11.12.09 @ 19:17pm
love the pic, awesome, my guess it's moving clockwise as viewed from above we are on the side view obviously, upward and away from us. Just a guess based on her structure.
Posted by spacermike on Thursday, 11.12.09 @ 18:28pm
Absolutely amazing.
Posted by Byron Pearce on Thursday, 11.12.09 @ 16:52pm
Wonderful image. Can we distinguish the gas jets streams from the black hole at the center?
José Roberto
Posted by siqueira on Thursday, 11.12.09 @ 14:56pm
Just wonderful
Thank you
Posted by Lawrence Migdale on Wednesday, 11.11.09 @ 11:28am
If you could produce a three dimensional version of this portion of space how would it look? In a three dimensional box which way is the black hole moving through space?
Posted by Paul Schurr on Wednesday, 11.11.09 @ 09:53am