Bullet Cluster
The Bullet Cluster (1E 0657-56) consists of two colliding clusters of galaxies. Strictly speaking, the name Bullet Cluster refers to the smaller subcluster, moving away from the larger one. It is at a comoving radial distance of 1.141 Gpc (3.72 billion light-years).
| Bullet Cluster | |
|---|---|
X-ray photo by Chandra X-ray Observatory. Exposure time was 140 hours. The scale is shown in megaparsecs. Redshift (z) = 0.3, meaning its light has wavelengths stretched by a factor of 1.3. | |
| Observation data (Epoch J2000) | |
| Constellation(s) | Carina |
| Right ascension | 06h 58m 37.9s |
| Declination | −55° 57′ 0″ |
| Number of galaxies | ~40 |
| Redshift | 0.296 |
| Distance | 1.141 Gpc (3.7 billion light-years). |
| ICM temperature | 17.4 ± 2.5 keV |
| X-ray luminosity | 1.4 ± 0.3 × 1039 h50−2 joule/s (bolometric) |
| X-ray flux | 5.6 ± 0.6 × 10−19 watt/cm2 (0.1–2.4 keV) |
| Other designations | |
| 1E 0657-56, 1E 0657-558 | |
The object is of a particular note for astrophysicists, because gravitational lensing studies of the Bullet Cluster are claimed to provide strong evidence for the existence of dark matter. Observations of other galaxy cluster collisions, such as MACS J0025.4-1222, similarly support the existence of dark matter.
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