Chandra Release - September 6, 2002

Visual Description: Tycho's Supernova Remnant

Tycho's supernova remnant is featured in this Chandra X-ray Observatory image. The shape of the image is circular with intricate, swirling patterns of gas and dust that make up the supernova remnant. The dominant colors in the image are blue, green, yellow and brown on a black background. Red, green, and blue represent low, medium and high energies, respectively.  The Chandra image reveals details of the turbulent debris created by the supernova explosion that was observed by the Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe in the year 1572. The image is cut off at the bottom because the southernmost region of the remnant fell outside the field of view of the detector.  A shock wave produced by the expanding debris is outlined by the strikingly sharp blue circular arcs of twenty million degree Celsius gas seen on the outer rim. The stellar debris, which has a temperature of about ten million degrees and is visible only in X-rays, shows up as mottled yellow, green and reddish-brown fingers of gas.