Normal Galaxies & Starburst Galaxies

M101: A large spiral galaxy about 25 million light years away in the constellation Ursa Major. More at http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2008/m101/

Download the desktop: http://chandra.harvard.edu/resources/desktops_year.html?year=2008

M84: A massive elliptical galaxy about 55 million light years away in the Virgo Cluster. More at http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2008/m84/

-Kim Arcand, CXC

Last week, we put out a press release on an elliptical galaxy known as NGC 4649. Using Chandra data, a group of astronomers measured the temperature of the hot gas around the galaxy to come up with an independent way to measure the size of the gigantic black hole at the center. You can read more about the details in the press release.