M82
(Image and Text Credit: NASA/CXC/SAO/PSU/CMU)
M82, at a distance of 11 million light years from Earth, is the nearest starburst galaxy. Massive stars are forming and expiring in M82 at a rate ten times higher than in our galaxy. The bright spots in the center are supernova remnants and X-ray binaries. These are some of the brightest such objects known. The luminosity of the X-ray binaries suggests that most contain a black hole. The diffuse X-ray light in the image extends over several thousand light years, and is caused by multimillion degree gas flowing out of M82. A close encounter with a large galaxy, M81, in the last 100 million years is thought to be the cause of the starburst activity. Chandra X-ray Observatory
Click here for jpg version
| Additions or Comments: Have we left anything out? Is there something you would like to have added to this page (a link to your own group's research page, for example...)? |
IMAGES |
By Mission |
Stars |
HEASARC Home | Observatories | Archive | Calibration | Software | Tools | Students/Teachers/Public
Last modified: Thursday, 26-Jun-2003 13:48:46 EDT