File:NGC 4649- A New Way To Weigh Giant Black Hole (An elliptical galaxy about 51 million light years from Earth in the constellation Virgo.) (2941511808).jpg

Description: A composite image of data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory (shown in purple) and Hubble Space Telescope (blue) shows the giant elliptical galaxy NGC 4649. By applying a new technique, scientists used Chandra data to measure the black hole at the galaxy's center to be about 3.4 billion times more massive than the Sun. The value from this X-ray technique is consistent with a more traditional method observing the motions of stars near the black hole in optical light. NGC 4649 is now one of only a handful of galaxies for which the mass of a supermassive black hole has been measured with two different methods.

Creator/Photographer: Chandra X-ray Observatory

NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, which was launched and deployed by Space Shuttle Columbia on July 23, 1999, is the most sophisticated X-ray observatory built to date. The mirrors on Chandra are the largest, most precisely shaped and aligned, and smoothest mirrors ever constructed. Chandra is helping scientists better understand the hot, turbulent regions of space and answer fundamental questions about origin, evolution, and destiny of the Universe. The images Chandra makes are twenty-five times sharper than the best previous X-ray telescope. NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., manages the Chandra program for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory controls Chandra science and flight operations from the Chandra X-ray Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Medium: Chandra telescope x-ray

Date: 2008

Persistent URL: chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2008/ngc4649/

Repository: Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory

Gift line: X-ray: NASA/CXC/Univ. of California Irvine/P.Humphrey et al.; Optical: NASA/STScI