Chandra Release - January 9, 2002

Visual Description: Galactic Center

The Chandra X-ray Observatory mosaic image of the center of our Milky Way galaxy is dominated by various shades of red, orange, blue, and green.  The image showcases many Chandra observations stitched together as squared diamonds, like a jagged rectangular quilt.  The key structures in the image include the central supermassive black hole (called Sagittarius A*), which is located at the center of the Milky Way. It is tucked inside a bright white patch in the center of the image.  This 400 by 900 light-year swath also reveals hundreds of white dwarf stars, neutron stars, and smaller black holes bathed in an incandescent fog of multimillion-degree gas. The colors indicate X-ray energy bands detected by Chandra: red (low), green (medium), and blue (high).