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A undated handout image made available by NASA on 26 January 2015 showing a spiral galaxy similar to the Milky Way glittering with hundreds of X-ray points of light. The galaxy is officially named Messier 51 (M51) or NGC 5194, but often goes by its nickname of the “Whirlpool Galaxy”. Like the Milky Way, the Whirlpool is a spiral galaxy with spectacular arms of stars and dust. M51 is located 30 million light years from Earth, and its face-on orientation to Earth gives us a perspective that we can never get of our own spiral galactic home. By using Chandra, astronomers can peer into the Whirlpool to uncover things that can only be detected in X-rays. In this new composite image, Chandra data are shown in purple while optical data from the Hubble Space Telescope are red, green and blue. Chandra X-ray Center is releasing a set of images that combine data from telescopes tuned to different wavelengths of light, as it celebrates the International Year of Light. (Photo by EPA/NASA/CXC)
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