PKS 0637-752: a luminous quasar 15/08/1999
PKS 0637-72 is so distant that we see it as it was 6 billion years ago. It is a luminous quasar that radiates with the power of 10 trillion suns from a region smaller than our solar system. The source of this prodigious energy is believed to be a supermassive black hole. Radio observations of PKS 0637-752 show that it has an extended radio jet that stretches across several hundred thousand light years. Chandra's x-ray image reveals a powerful x-ray jet of similar size that is probably due to a beam of extremely high energy particles.
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Image Credit: NASA, CXC, SAO  
PKS 0637-72 is so distant that we see it as it was 6 billion years ago. It is a luminous quasar that radiates with the power of 10 trillion suns from a region smaller than our solar system. The source of this prodigious energy is believed to be a supermassive black hole.

Radio observations of PKS 0637-752 show that it has an extended radio jet that stretches across several hundred thousand light years. Chandra's x-ray image made with the Advanced CCD Imaging Spectrometer (ACIS) reveals a powerful x-ray jet of similar size that is probably due to a beam of extremely high-energy particles.

The x-ray jet observed for the first time by Chandra in PKS 0637-752, is a dramatic example of a cosmic jet. It has blasted outward from the quasar into intergalactic space for a distance of at least 200,000 light years! The jet's presence means that electromagnetic forces are continually accelerating electrons to extremely high energies over enormous distances. Chandra observations, combined with radio observations, should provide insight into this important cosmic energy conversion process.
 
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