Chandra Stories
Coming in Hot — NASA’s Chandra Checks Habitability of Exoplanets
This graphic shows a three-dimensional map of stars near the Sun. These stars are close enough that they could be prime targets for direct imaging searches for planets using future telescopes. The blue haloes represent stars that have been observed…
Travel Through Data From Space in New 3D Instagram Experiences
A new project provides special 3D “experiences” on Instagram using data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and other telescopes through augmented reality (AR), allowing users to travel virtually through objects in space. These new experiences of astronomical objects – including…
NASA’s Chandra Releases Doubleheader of Blockbuster Hits
New movies of two of the most famous objects in the sky — the Crab Nebula and Cassiopeia A — are being released from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory. Each includes X-ray data collected by Chandra over about two decades. They…
Listen to the Universe: New NASA Sonifications and Documentary
Three new sonifications of images from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and other telescopes have been released in conjunction with a new documentary about the project that makes its debut on the NASA+ streaming platform. Sonification is the process of translating…
NASA Scientists Discover a Novel Galactic ‘Fossil’
Researchers at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, have discovered X-ray activity that sheds light on the evolution of galaxies. The X-rays outline giant clouds of cold gas in the nearby spiral galaxy NGC 4945. The gas appears…
NASA Features New Discoveries at American Astronomical Society Meeting
Experts will discuss new research from NASA missions at the 243rd meeting of the American Astronomical Society (AAS), on topics ranging from planets outside our solar system to fleeting, high-energy explosions in the universe. The meeting will take place Jan.…
NASA Telescope Data Becomes Music You Can Play
For millennia, musicians have looked to the heavens for inspiration. Now a new collaboration is enabling actual data from NASA telescopes to be used as the basis for original music that can be played by humans. Since 2020, the “sonification” project at NASA’s Chandra X-ray…
NASA Telescopes Discover Record-Breaking Black Hole
Astronomers have discovered the most distant black hole yet seen in X-rays, using NASA telescopes. The black hole is at an early stage of growth that had never been witnessed before, where its mass is similar to that of its…
NASA X-ray Telescopes Reveal the “Bones” of a Ghostly Cosmic Hand
In 1895, Wilhelm Röntgen discovered X-rays and used them to image the bones in his wife’s hand, kicking off a revolutionary diagnostic tool for medicine. Now two of NASA’s X-ray space telescopes have combined their imaging powers to unveil the…
Chandra Rewinds Story of Great Eruption of the 1840s
A new time-lapse sequence shows Eta Carinae as it changes over time from 1999 to 2020.