Chandra Release - July 03, 2019

Visual Description: Q2237+0305

Four quasars are present in this four-panel image. Each quasar is represented by a series of two or four pink dots appearing on a solid black background. Using data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and chance alignments across billions of light years, astronomers have deployed a technique to measure the spin of supermassive black holes. The matter in one of these cosmic vortices is swirling around its black hole at greater than about 70% of the speed of light. Astronomers took advantage of a natural phenomenon called a gravitational lens. With just the right alignment, the bending of space-time by a massive object, such as a large galaxy, can magnify and produce multiple images of a distant object, as predicted by Einstein.
Gravitational lensing of the light from each of these quasars by an intervening galaxy has created multiple images of each quasar, as shown by these Chandra images of four of the targets. The sharp imaging ability of Chandra is needed to separate the multiple, lensed images of each quasar. From top left to bottom right the quasars are: Q2237+0305, HE0435-1223, HE1104-1805, and SDSS1004.