Credit: NASA/MIT/P.Ogle et al.

Chandra's image of the central region of the galaxy NGC 4151 shows a massive cloud of hot gas that is 3000 light years across. The gas is heated by X rays from gas very near a giant black hole in the center of the image. A spectrum made with the high-energy spectrometer aboard Chandra revealed that the gas contains a variety of heavy elements such as nitrogen, oxygen, neon, magnesium, aluminum, silicon, and iron. The elongated shape of the cloud confirms that X-rays from the black hole are collimated into a beam that illuminates only portions of the gas in the galaxy.

Provider: Chandra X-ray Observatory

Image Source: http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2000/ngc4151/

Curator: Chandra X-ray Observatory, Cambridge, MA, USA

Image Use Policy: http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/image_use.html