Happy 25th anniversary, Chandra! NASA celebrates with 25 breathtaking images from flagship X-ray observatory

Story

Happy 25th anniversary, Chandra! NASA celebrates with 25 breathtaking images from flagship X-ray observatory


It really is the summer of cosmic anniversaries. 

Following the anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing and the anniversary of Space.com opening its doors to the internet, NASA‘s Chandra X-ray Observatory, the world’s most powerful X-ray telescope, turns 25 today — and to celebrate the observatory’s legacy, NASA has released 25 exquisite, never-before-seen pictures of iconic astronomical objects like the Crab Nebula, Pillars of Creation and Cassiopeia A that take us on a breathtaking journey through the universe through Chandra’s eyes.

Chandra launched in 1999 — the same year Space.com started — aboard Space Shuttle Columbia. From its egg-shaped orbit high above Earth’s atmosphere that takes it over one-third of the way to the moon, the observatory has led to many discoveries by recording x-ray emissions beamed from long-dead stars, supermassive black holes and clusters of galaxies.

The 25 new Chandra images. (Image credit: NASA/CXC/SAO)

“For a quarter century, Chandra has made discovery after amazing discovery,” Pat Slane, the director of the Chandra X-ray Center located at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Massachusetts, said in a statement. “Astronomers have used Chandra to investigate mysteries that we didn’t even know about when we were building the telescope — including exoplanets and dark energy.”  



Leave a Comment