X-ray, Infrared & Optical Images of NGC 3627
These images of the galaxy NGC 3627 show X-rays from Chandra, infrared data from Spitzer, and optical data from Hubble and the Very Large Telescope. Astronomers conducted a survey of 62 galaxies - which included NGC 3627 - to study the supermassive black holes at their centers. Among this sample, 37 galaxies with X-ray sources are supermassive black hole candidates, and seven were not previously known. Confirming previous Chandra results, this study finds the fraction of galaxies hosting supermassive black holes is much higher than in optical searches for black holes that are relatively inactive.
(Credit: NASA/CXC/Ohio State Univ./C.Grier et al.; Optical: NASA/STScI, ESO/WFI; Infrared: NASA/JPL-Caltech)