Chandra Release - September 19, 2013

Visual Description: Coma Cluster

The image features an X-ray and optical view of the Coma Cluster of galaxies.  The X-ray data from the Chandra X-ray Observatory is dominated by a magenta color, while the optical image from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey displays various shades of pale blue and yellow-white.  The overall structure of the Coma Cluster resembles an oddly textured magenta crab with two giant eyes walking towards the viewer, a swarm of bees around it. In this image, the Chandra data have been processed so extra detail can be seen.  The X-ray emission is from multimillion-degree gas and the optical data shows galaxies in the Coma Cluster, which contain only about 1/6 the mass in hot gas. Only the brightest X-ray emission is shown here, to emphasize the arms, but the hot gas is present over the entire field of view.