Chandra Release - May 28, 2009

Visual Description: HDF 130

This X-ray, radio and optical image of the black hole HDF 130 showcases a predominantly dark background with speckles and dots of light blue and pale colored dots across it. The central region of the image includes a structure that looks like a little pale blue bowtie tipped to the upper left with a tiny ruby tie pin at its center. This composite image shows a small region of the Chandra Deep Field North in blue. An image from the Multi-Element Radio Linked Interferometer Network (MERLIN), an array of radio telescopes, is in red. An optical image from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey is shown in white, pale yellow and orange.  The diffuse blue object near the center of the image is believed to be a cosmic "ghost" generated by a huge eruption from a supermassive black hole in a distant galaxy. This X-ray ghost, a.k.a. HDF 130, remains after powerful radio waves from particles traveling away from the black hole at almost the speed of light, have died off.