Hubble celebrates International Year of Astronomy with new view of Milky Way

Esahubble_ann0912a_1024

esahubble_ann0912a November 10th, 2009

Credit: NASA & ESA

A never-before-seen view of the turbulent heart of our Milky Way galaxy provided by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope and its companion Great Observatories (the Spitzer Space Telescope and the Chandra X-ray Observatory) is being unveiled on 10 Nov 2009. This event will commemorate the 400 years since Galileo first turned his telescope to the heavens in 1609. Although best known for its visible-light images, Hubble also observes over a limited range of infrared light and this sweeping panorama is the sharpest infrared picture ever made of the galactic centre region. The composite image made up of an image from each telescope features the spectacle of stellar evolution: from vibrant regions of star birth, to young hot stars, to old cool stars, to seething remnants of stellar death called black holes. This activity occurs against a fiery backdrop in the crowded, hostile environment of the galaxy's core, the centre of which is dominated by a supermassive black hole nearly four million times more massive than our Sun. Permeating the region is a diffuse, blue haze of X-ray light from gas that has been heated to millions of degrees by outflows from the supermassive black hole as well as by winds from massive stars and by stellar explosions. Infrared light reveals more than a hundred thousand stars along with glowing dust clouds that create complex structures including compact globules, long filaments, and finger-like "pillars of creation," where newborn stars are just beginning to break out of their dark, dusty cocoons.

Provider: Hubble Space Telescope | ESA

Image Source: http://www.spacetelescope.org/images/ann0912a/

Curator: ESA/Hubble, Garching bei München, Germany

Image Use Policy: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

Image Details

Image Type
Observation
Object Name
Sagittarius
Subject - Milky Way
Galaxy > Component > Center/Core
Esahubble_ann0912a_128
 

Position Details

Position (ICRS)
RA = 17h 45m 46.6s
DEC = -28° 54’ 50.0”
Orientation
North is 58.7° CCW
Field of View
32.4 x 16.2 arcminutes
Constellation
Sagittarius

Color Mapping

  Telescope Spectral Band Wavelength
Blue Chandra (ACIS) X-ray -
Yellow Hubble (NICMOS) Infrared (Near-IR) -
Red Spitzer (IRAC) Infrared (Near-IR) -
Esahubble_ann0912a_1280
×
ID
ann0912a
Subject Category
B.5.4.9  
Subject Name
Sagittarius
Credits
NASA & ESA
Release Date
2009-11-10T17:00:00
Lightyears
Redshift
Reference Url
http://www.spacetelescope.org/images/ann0912a/
Type
Observation
Image Quality
Distance Notes
Facility
Chandra, Hubble Space Telescope, Spitzer Space Telescope
Instrument
ACIS, NICMOS, IRAC
Color Assignment
Blue, Yellow, Red
Band
X-ray, Infrared, Infrared
Bandpass
-, Near-IR, Near-IR
Central Wavelength
Start Time
Integration Time
Dataset ID
Notes
Coordinate Frame
ICRS
Equinox
J2000
Reference Value
266.444041839, -28.913897852
Reference Dimension
9725.0, 4862.0
Reference Pixel
4872.00635386, 2435.74341463
Scale
-5.55619884472e-05, 5.55619884472e-05
Rotation
58.66
Coordinate System Projection:
TAN
Quality
Full
FITS Header
Notes
Creator (Curator)
ESA/Hubble
URL
http://www.spacetelescope.org/
Name
Email
Telephone
Address
Karl-Schwarzschild-Strasse 2
City
Garching bei München
State/Province
Postal Code
D-85748
Country
Germany
Rights
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
Publisher
ESA/Hubble
Publisher ID
esahubble
Resource ID
ann0912a
Metadata Date
2015-10-02T14:25:33.159969
Metadata Version
1.1
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Detailed color mapping information coming soon...

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There is no distance meta data in this image.

 

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