A young
star cluster with an age of one or two million years contains some of the
hottest, brightest, and most massive stars known so far.
Little was
known previously about the cluster Westerlund 2, which is shrouded in interstellar
dust and gas. However, infrared and X-ray observations from the Chandra X-ray
Observatory have revealed a very high density of massive stars that are bright
in X-rays, plus diffuse X-ray emission. Low energy X-rays appear in red,
intermediate energy X-rays in green and high energy X-rays in blue.
X-ray sources
include an incredibly massive double star system called WR20a, visible as the
bright yellow point just below and to the right of the cluster's center. This
system contains stars with masses of 82 and 83 times that of the Sun. The dense
streams of matter steadily ejected by these two massive stars, called stellar
winds, collide with each other and radiate a huge amount of X-ray emissions.
— NASA/CXC and SPACE.com Staff
Credit: NASA/CXC/Univ. de Liege/Y. Naze
et al
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