Chandra images thrill scientists at NASA

A second image shows a luminous quasar shooting a powerful X-ray jet 200,000 light years into space. The quasar radiates with the power of 10 trillion suns, energy which scientists believe may come from a black hole at the centre.

8220;We were astounded by these images,8221; said Harvey Tananbaum, director of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory8217;s Chandra X-ray Centre in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

8220;We see the collision of the debris from the exploded star with the matter around it. We see shock waves rushing into interstellar space at millions of miles per hour. And, as areal bonus, we see for the first time a tantalizing bright point near the centre of the remnant that could possibly be a collapsed star associated with the outburst,8221; Tananbaum said on Thursday.

The images were captured shortly after Chandra8217;s sunshade door was opened for the first time last week. The observatory, launched from the space shuttle in July, is still in its orbital check-out and calibration phase.The observatory has the potential to 8220;revolutionize astronomy8221;, said Edward Weiler, Associate Administrator of Space Science at NASA headquarters in Washington.