X Rays Indicate Star Ripped Up by Black Hole
24.02.2004

What could rip a star apart? A black hole. Giant black holes in just the right mass range would pull on the front of a closely passing star much more strongly than on the back.

The Supermassive Black Holes of NGC 6240
28.11.2002

The Hubble optical image on the left shows NGC 6240 in the throes of a titanic galaxy - galaxy collision 400 million light-years away. As the cosmic catastrophe plays out, the merging galaxies spew forth distorted tidal tails of stars, gas, and dust and undergo frantic bursts of star formation.

NGC 1068 and the X Ray Flashlight
11.07.2003

At night, tilting a flashlight up under your chin hides the glowing bulb from the direct view of your friends. Light from the bulb still reflects from your face though, and can give you a startling appearance.

The Center of the Circinus Galaxy in X Rays
16.05.2001

Are black holes the cause of X-rays that pour out from the center of the Circinus galaxy? A new high-resolution image from the orbiting Chandra X-ray Observatory has resolved the inner regions of this nearby galaxy into several smaller sources. The image is shown above in representative-color.

Spinning Black Holes and MCG 6 30 15
29.10.2001

What makes the core of galaxy MCG-6-30-15 so bright? Some astronomers believe the answer is a massive spinning black hole. If so, this would be the first observational indication that it is possible to make a black hole act like a battery -- and tap into its rotational energy.

Jumbled Galaxy Centaurus A
30.06.2007

At the center of this sharp skyscape, Centaurus A seems to be a fantastic jumble of old yellow stars, young blue star clusters, and imposing dark dust lanes. Spanning over 60,000 light-years, the peculiar elliptical galaxy is apparently the result of a collision of two otherwise normal galaxies.

X-Rays From The Galactic Center
20.01.2000

Exploring quasars and active galaxies in the distant universe, astronomers have come to believe that most galaxies have massive black holes at their centers. Swirling stars and a strong, variable radio source offer convincing evidence that even our own Milky Way galaxy's center harbors such a bizarre object, a mere 30,000 light-years away.

The Perseus Cluster s X Ray Skull
31.10.2000

This haunting image from the orbiting Chandra Observatory reveals the Perseus Cluster of Galaxies in x-rays, photons with a thousand or more times the energy of visible light. Three hundred twenty million light-years distant, the Perseus Cluster contains thousands of galaxies, but none of them are seen here.

The Center of Centaurus A
22.08.1999

A fantastic jumble of young blue star clusters, gigantic glowing gas clouds, and imposing dark dust lanes surrounds the central region of the active galaxy Centaurus A. This mosaic of Hubble Space Telescope images taken in blue, green, and red light has been processed to present a natural color picture of this cosmic maelstrom.

M82 s Middle Mass Black Hole
14.09.2000

Black holes are probably the most bizarre creatures in the modern astronomical zoo. And after years of pondering black holes as either stellar mass objects seen in binary star systems or enormous supermassive black holes at the centers of galaxies, astronomers now have strong evidence