Chandra Release - January 30, 2007

Visual Description: G11.2-0.3

 The Chandra X-ray Observatory image is of the supernova remnant G11.2-0.3.  G11.2 is a circularly symmetric supernova remnant that contains a dense, rotating dead star at its center, representing a textbook case of what the remnant of an exploding star should look like after a couple thousand years.  The image looks like a fluffy ring, or a bicycle wheel with a couple irregular spokes. The ring looks grainy or speckled. The color palette of the image is dominated by shades of blue-purple in the very center, with green and yellow throughout the ring and “spokes” on a plain black background.  In Chandra's X-ray image, the pulsar of the supernova remnant and a cigar-shaped cloud of energetic particles surrounding it, known as a pulsar wind nebula, are predominantly seen as high-energy X-rays (blue) at the very center. The shell of heated gas from the outer layers of the exploded star surrounds the pulsar and the pulsar wind nebula and emits lower-energy X-rays (represented in the green and yellow colors).