NASA Releases Never-Before-Seen Galaxies And Nebulae Stunning Photos

This actually all comes courtesy of one telescope, the Chandra X-Ray Observatory, which was first launched into space in 1999. The Hubble telescope was also launched around this time and the two telescopes are still some of the most powerful ones that NASA has developed. NASA continually upgrades both of them with new technology over the years, enabling them to capture incredible photos like the ones now shared.

Chandra differs from the Hubble telescope in part based on their trajectories in space. The Hubble keeps a pretty close orbit to Earth, whereas Chandra is much wider in its path. In its mission to capture images like the ones NASA shared in the latest photos, Chandra can travel as close as 6,000 miles from the Earth all the way up to 86,400 miles away from the Earth. And that is all in just 64 hours of its orbiting cycle.

NASA released this latest batch of photos last week in honor of the 25^th anniversary of when the Chandra was launched into space. In its time so far, it has collected around 25,000 photos. Some of what NASA shared features images from the center of the Milky Way galaxy, the aftermath of a supernova that occurred, and the colorful Eagle nebula many light years beyond the Earth.

NASA also shared that they are very patient in capturing the photos that they want with the Chandra. Some of the images captured have come through thousands of hours of observation time waiting for the right sighting. The images released of the center of the Milky Way in this batch of photos are actually the first ones that the Chandra has been able to capture in its more than two decades in space.

Pat Slane is the director of the Chandra X-ray Center at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He shared the significance of what Chandra is doing and NASA being able to acquire these kinds of photos, saying, “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.”

Part of what makes Chandra so special is the technology that NASA utilized to capture these kinds of photos. It is achieved via a collection of four of the smoothest mirrors that have ever been created and that have been applied to Chandra. These mirrors are able to redirect incoming X-rays and channel them to an extremely narrow point that the telescope then records. It is an incredible combination of technology and scientific knowledge that has provided NASA with access to these unbelievable photos and discoveries.

NASA says that beyond the recent batch of photos they have shared, Chandra has helped them make monumental breakthroughs in our knowledge about space. This includes finding the oldest black hole known to humans, and even discovering concrete proof of the existence of dark matter. The revelations that Chandra has given us cannot be overstated in how truly amazing they are.