Chandra Release - January 5, 2020

Visual Description: Crab Nebula

Visible, infrared, and X-ray data from NASA's Great Observatories were combined to create a three-dimensional representation of the Crab Nebula. This graphic is a visualization based on images from the Chandra, Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes. The powerhouse "engine" energizing the entire system is a pulsar, a rapidly spinning neutron star, that is shooting blistering pulses of radiation towards us 30 times a second with clockwork precision. The image still showcases a dramatic filamentary shape of bright colors with Chandra X-ray in purple towards the center, surrounded by a cocoon of Hubble optical and Spitzer infrared in yellow and orange respectively. The video dissects the intricate nested structure that makes up the stellar corpse, giving viewers a glimpse of the extreme and complex physical processes powering the nebula.