Chandra Release - February 21, 2012

Visual Description: IGR J17091-3624

This artist's impression shows a binary system containing a stellar-mass black hole called IGR J17091-3624, or IGR J17091 for short.  On the right of the image, there is a large, bright blue and white star. To the left is a dark red-orange accretion disk around a black hole. The strong gravity of the black hole is pulling gas away from a companion star on the right. This gas forms a disk of hot gas around the black hole, and the wind is driven off this disk, shown as bright blue swirls coming off the disk.  Observations with NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory clocked the fastest wind seen at the time of observation blowing off a disk around this stellar-mass black hole. Stellar-mass black holes are born when extremely massive stars collapse and typically weigh between five and 10 times the mass of the Sun.