NASA | MSFC | SAO | Chandra X-ray Observatory | 2020 Feb 27
Evidence for the biggest explosion seen in the Universe is contained in these composite images. This discovery, covered in our latest press release, combines data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, ESA's XMM-Newton, the Murchison Widefield Array, and the Giant Metrewave Telescope.
This extremely powerful eruption occurred in the Ophiuchus galaxy cluster, which is located about 390 million light years from Earth. Galaxy clusters are the largest structures in the Universe held together by gravity, containing thousands of individual galaxies, dark matter, and hot gas.
The hot gas that pervades clusters like Ophiuchus gives off much of its light as X-rays. The main panel contains X-rays from XMM-Newton (pink) along with radio data from GMRT (blue), and infrared data from 2MASS (white). In the inset, Chandra's X-ray data are pink.
In the center of the Ophiuchus cluster is a large galaxy containing a supermassive black hole. Researchers have traced the source of this gigantic eruption to jets that blasted away from the black hole and carved out a large cavity in the hot gas. (A labeled version includes a dashed line showing the edge of the cavity in the hot gas seen in X-rays from both Chandra and XMM-Newton.) Radio emission from electrons accelerated to almost the speed of light fills this cavity, providing evidence that an eruption of unprecedented size took place. ...
Discovery of a Giant Radio Fossil in the Ophiuchus Galaxy Cluster ~ S. Giacintucci et al
- Astrophysical Journal 891(1):1 (2020 Mar 01) DOI: 10.3847/1538-4357/ab6a9d
- arXiv.org > astro-ph > arXiv:2002.01291 > 04 Feb 2020
Astronomers Detect Biggest Explosion in the History of the Universe
International Center for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR) | 2020 Feb 27