The Hot Gas Halo of the Sombrero Galaxy (M104)

Beyond the dust lane imaged by Hubble, XMM-Newton sees an enormous blob of hot gas at roughly several million degrees (violet), enveloping the entire galaxy.

M104 X-ray and optical composite — Outreach poster · Field of view 14′ × 9′ · 4200 × 2700 JPEG · Full-resolution PNG

Layers

Optical layer: HST galaxy body + DSS2 background PNG

X-ray layer: diffuse hot gas + point sources PNG

30′ wide-field versions

30 arcmin, energy color-coded — Energy color-coding: 0.5–1 keV pink · 1–2 keV violet · 2–4.5 keV cyan-blue PNG

30 arcmin, monochromatic violet — Monochromatic violet glow PNG

X-ray: ESA/XMM-Newton (EPIC, 0.5–4.5 keV, central exposure about 220 ks). Optical: ESA/Hubble & NASA, K. Noll (CC BY 4.0); DSS2. The hot-gas layer has point sources removed and large-scale adaptive smoothing applied; the outer glow is an artistically enhanced presentation for display purposes.

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