National Radio Astronomy Observatory
P.O. Box O
Socorro, NM 87801
http://www.nrao.edu

Orbital path of black-hole microquasar XTE J1118+480, over the past 230 million years. The black hole's orbital path is traced by the red line, with its current position shown at the end of the line. The yellow circles indicate the position of the Sun and Solar System.

CREDIT: I. Rodrigues and I.F. Mirabel, NRAO/AUI/NSF.

CREDIT: I. Rodrigues and I.F. Mirabel, Space Telescope Science Institute, NRAO/AUI/NSF.

The orbital-path graphic shown above with, at top left, an artist's conception of the black hole binary and its accretion disk (blue), pulling material from its companion star at left. At top right is a graph showing the variations in the X-ray brightness of XTE J1118+480 from January through July of 2000.

CREDIT: I. Rodrigues and I.F. Mirabel, NRAO/AUI/NSF.