Fact Sheet
Galactic Glow
Hot gas around a giant elliptical galaxy glows blue and purple in this composite image from two space-based observatories. The background image, which shows individual galaxies, is from Hubble Space Telescope. The surrounding gas was imaged in X-rays by Chandra X-Ray Observatory. The elliptical galaxy is known as NGC 1132, and it is about 300 million light-years away. The galaxy also contains vast amounts of dark matter, which exerts a gravitational pull on the matter around it but which produces no detectable energy. [NASA/CXC/Penn State/G.Garmire/ESA/STScI/M.West]
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