chandra_490 September 13th, 2011
Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/Univ of Hamburg/S.Schröter et al; Optical: NASA/NSF/IPAC-Caltech/UMass/2MASS, UNC/CTIO/PROMPT; Illustration: NASA/CXC/M.Weiss
This graphic contains an image (left) and illustration (right) of a nearby star, named CoRoT-2a, and an orbiting planet known as CoRoT-2b. The image contains X-rays from Chandra (purple) of CoRoT-2a along with optical and infrared data of the field of view in which it is found. CoRoT-2b, which is not seen in this image, orbits extremely closely to the star. In fact, the separation between the star and planet is only about 3 percent of the distance between the Earth and the Sun. The Chandra data indicate that the planet is being blasted by X-rays with such intensity that some 5 million tons of material are being eroded from the planet every second.
Provider: Chandra X-ray Observatory
Image Source: http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2011/corot/
Curator: Chandra X-ray Observatory, Cambridge, MA, USA
Image Use Policy: http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/image_use.html
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