Chandra (telescope)

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Chandra
Chandra
Type: X-ray telescope
Country: United StatesUnited States United States
Operator: NASA
COSPAR-ID : 1999-040B
Mission dates
Dimensions: 4800 kg
Begin: July 23, 1999, 04:31 UTC
Starting place: Kennedy Space Center , LC-39B
Launcher: Space Shuttle Columbia
Status: in orbit
Orbit data
Rotation time : 2d, 15h, 29min
Orbit inclination : 45.1 °
Apogee height 128,769 km
Perigee height 20,046 km

Chandra (full name Chandra X-ray Observatory ) is a satellite with an X-ray telescope . It was put into earth orbit on July 23, 1999 by NASA with the space shuttle Columbia (mission STS-93 ) and is named after the astronomer Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar . It is 13.8 m long and weighs 4.8 tons.

Planning and commissioning

How the quadruple nested Wolter telescope works (Illustration: NASA)

The X-ray Observatory has been in the development and construction AXAF ( A dvanced X -ray A strophysics F called acility), but renamed before the start of Chandra. Together with the Inertial Upper Stage , Chandra is the largest satellite to be launched into orbit by a space shuttle. His primary mission was scheduled for a period of five years, but has already been extended several times.

With the help of its maneuvering engines , the satellite was brought into space on a strongly eccentric elliptical orbit ( 80792 km, 0.802), which is largely above the Earth's radiation belt , so that bremsstrahlung from particles of the solar wind and cosmic rays cannot influence the measurement. One orbit of the space telescope on its orbit takes 64 hours 18 minutes, of which around 55 hours can be used for observation.

Instruments

After the Hubble Space Telescope in the optical range and the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory in the gamma range, the Chandra X-ray satellite is the third of the four space observatories planned by NASA as part of the Great Observatory Program . In the infrared range, this program was completed by the Spitzer space telescope . The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory is responsible for the scientific supervision and control of the satellite .

Chandra is equipped with

  • a quadruple nested Wolter telescope
  • two transmission grating spectrometers, LETGS ( L ow E nergy T ransmission G ratings S pectrometer) for the energy range from 0.09 to 3 keV and
  • HETGS ( H igh E nergy T ransmission G rating S pectrometer) for the energy range 0.4-10 keV,
  • and with an imaging spectrometer (ACIS, A dvanced C CD I maging S pectrometer); this consists of 10 CCD chips and is sensitive to radiation energies of 0.2 to 10 keV.

With a maximum resolution of 0.5 arcseconds, Chandra's images are much better sharp than images from previous missions. In comparison, the very successful German X-ray satellite ROSAT had a resolution of around 4 arc seconds.

Chandra image of SN 2006gy (right) and the core of the galaxy NGC 1260

Results

In 2006, Chandra SN 2006gy was discovered, the most energetic supernova explosion observed to date (see picture).

literature

  • Wallace H. Tucker, et al .: Revealing the Universe - The Making of the Chandra X-ray Observatory. Harvard Univ. Press, Cambridge 2001, ISBN 0-674-00497-3 .

Web links

Commons : Chandra (telescope)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

swell

  1. Chandra in the Encyclopedia Astronautica , accessed June 24, 2011.
  2. Chandra X-ray Observatory Quick Facts. NASA, accessed on May 28, 2014 (English): "The Chandra X-ray Observatory, with its Inertial Upper Stage and support equipment, is the largest and heaviest payload ever launched by the Space Shuttle."
  3. Chandra :: Chronicles :: Chandra's Mission Extended to 2009 :: September 28, 2001. In: chandra.harvard.edu. Retrieved October 3, 2015 .
  4. ^ NASA: Chandra Fact Sheet