Star Cluster NGC 1850 in Dorado | NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory

Star Cluster NGC 1850 in Dorado | NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory

NGC 1850 is a bright, double star cluster that lies in the Large Magellanic Cloud—a small neighbor galaxy to the Milky Way. It contains a black hole with a mass of about eleven Suns, and a companion star. No clear detection of X-rays with Chandra implies that the black hole is not quickly pulling material away from its companion. This composite image displays x-rays from Chandra (magenta); optical light from the Hubble Space Telescope (red, yellow, green, cyan, blue); infrared light from the Spitzer Space Telescope (red).

This image features a double star cluster, a blue-tinted cloud, and several neon purple dots. The bright, golden stars in the larger cluster fill the upper center of the image. The other cluster is much smaller and coincides with one of the neon purple circles located slightly above and to the right of the image’s center. This and the other purple circles are X-ray sources detected with Chandra. To our left of the combined cluster is a vertical streak of blue-tinted cloud.

Image Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO; Optical: NASA/ESA/STScI; Infrared: NASA/JPL/CalTech/Spitzer; Image Processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/J. Major, K. Arcand

Release Date: July 10, 2001

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