Honoring and Celebrating 25 Years of Chandra

Kimberly Arcand & Megan Watzke

For those of us involved with the Chandra X-ray Observatory, this year marks a special milestone: twenty-five years ago, on July 23, 1999, the Space Shuttle Columbia launched Chandra into space, starting a quarter century of excellence and exploration. With the 25th anniversary on the horizon, we have been planning projects over the past months and years to help celebrate this achievement. While the recent budget news has been disheartening, we are nevertheless persisting in trying to highlight all of the science Chandra has already accomplished—and will hopefully still achieve in the future.

This article highlights some of the public-facing projects for Chandra's 25th anniversary. There are even more efforts aimed at the scientific community—ranging from colloquia at universities across the world to the Chandra 25th symposium in December 2024—that will be discussed elsewhere. A full list of events, including those aimed at scientists, is at https://cxc.harvard.edu/cdo/chandra25/.

We hope that the projects below will help those outside the mission and the field gain some understanding and appreciation of all that Chandra can do.

Astronomy on Tap: April–December 2024

Astronomy on Tap (AoT) is a network of outreach events focused on engaging talks on space and astronomy for general audiences, typically held in the social atmosphere of pubs and restaurants. Several AoT venues around the country have hosted and will host Chandra 25th anniversary themed events, ranging from Boston, Los Angeles, and New York City to Baton Rouge, Nashville, and Pittsburgh. In addition, international AoT satellite locations including Groningen, The Netherlands, and Paris, France, have also answered the Chandra 25 call, and even more satellites are expected to join as the year progresses. Keep an eye on the AoT events page to see if any Chandra talks are coming to your town.

Red Sox STEM Day: June 5, 2024

For several years, Chandra has been participating in the annual Red Sox STEM day. On June 5th, STS-93 Mission Specialist Cady Coleman joined the Chandra team for a day of baseball and black holes with a special video feature by Wally, the Red Sox mascot. With over 3,000 local students in attendance, CXC volunteers staffed a Chandra booth where they led educational activities and handed out anniversary materials. NESN, the Red Sox’s television broadcaster, featured Chandra in a spot during the game, and an original video produced by Chandra's Communications and Public Engagement (CPE) group was highlighted on Fenway Park’s jumbotron during the event. There were talks in the morning including one by Kimberly Arcand on Chandra science and the headline talk on the STS-93 mission by Cady Coleman. That afternoon, with Chandra staff cheering them on from right field, the Red Sox blew past Atlanta, 9–0.

Sphere: May–July 2024

Sphere is a fully-interactive cinematic venue next to the Las Vegas Strip that has been host to some of the biggest names in entertainment. On May 16, 2024, Sphere began a residency of Dead & Company of shows (that has since been extended into mid-August) featuring an unprecedented collaboration between Mickey Hart (drummer of Dead & Company and, formerly, the Grateful Dead) and Chandra data.

The collaboration, which arose after a friend of Mickey Hart attended a talk on Chandra sonification work by Kimberly Arcand at a Smithsonian event for the CfA, utilizes Sphere’s 16k wraparound screen to display artistic versions of Chandra and multiwavelength imagery. Sonifications of the Chandra data inspired the Dead & Company’s improvisational “Drums and Space” segment, the first time such sonified data have been worked into original live performances at this magnitude and the first time NASA/Smithsonian data have been projected on Sphere. Over 500,000 audience members will experience the Chandra content by the end of the residency.

Chandra in Washington, D.C.

Beginning in June, the inside of the lobby of NASA Headquarters featured an exhibit with information and images about Chandra and its twenty-five years of science. Then, starting mid-July, Chandra images are featured in 6 stops of the Washington, D.C. metro system: L’Enfant Plaza, Gallery Place, Metro Center, NoMa—Gallaudet U, Crystal City, and Farragut North stations. Approximately 500,000 riders are expected to pass through these stations during the time frame the Chandra images will be in place.

Summer Solstice Events at Smithsonian: June 22, 2024

The summer solstice gives the Smithsonian an opportunity to open its doors early and stay up late during its annual “Solstice Saturday.” This year Chandra's 25th anniversary was featured as a special theme in the activities around this day and night on the National Mall.

There was a Chandra booth at the “Astronomy on the Mall” event, where four SAO scientists and educators, including Chandra's Rodolfo Montez Jr. and Rutuparna Das, engaged with thousands of members of the public. The booth showcased Chandra science from exploded stars to black holes and exhibited sonifications, 3D prints, augmented reality experiences, handouts, and activities celebrating Chandra's 25th anniversary. At the Smithsonian’s Hirshhorn Museum, Kimberly Arcand introduced a world-premiere screening and panel discussion on the new Chandra documentary on sonification, Listen to the Universe (streaming on NASA+). In the National Air and Space Museum, Chandra sonifications were shown in the planetarium, events included Chandra material on women in STEM, and the museum featured Chandra-focused trivia, scavenger hunts, and handouts. And over at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History, Lights Out, the current exhibit on light pollution, features Chandra content, as well. All told, over 70,000 people attended the events that day where Chandra content was featured.

US Space & Rocket Center: August 23, 2024

A panel discussion including STS-93 Commander Eileen Collins and Chandra scientists will be held in the planetarium at the US Space & Rocket Center (USSRC), down the road from the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, in celebration of Chandra's 25th anniversary. This event will be open to the public and include a Chandra-themed planetarium show directed by the USSRC, which will also be broadcast online.

National Air and Space Museum lecture: September 25, 2024

The annual John H. Glenn Lecture in Space History will feature a moderated discussion about Chandra with Chandra scientists Patrick Slane and Kimberly Arcand and STS-93 crewmembers Eileen Collins and Cady Coleman. This annual event is a signature lecture series for the National Air and Space Museum

Online, In Press, and on TV

In addition to the events above, the CPE team has also collaborated on and led a slew of Chandra 25th products. These include an educational insert in USA Today featuring Chandra content that appeared on April 7th and was sent to over 1.3 million print subscribers, a Smithsonian Sidedoor 2-episode podcast on Chandra and black holes released June 5th (parts one and two), an Apple Maps guide (location-based storytelling) for Chandra that debuted in March, and a special reissue and new LP vinyl album of Chandra sonifications called Universal Harmonies, which can be found on bandcamp. In April, special augmented reality 3D Instagram experiences (also known as filters) of Chandra data were released, the first 3D Instagram experiences to also incorporate data sonifications, reaching over 2 million people. In June, Chandra was included as a clue on the TV game show Jeopardy!, reaching about 9 million viewers.

Throughout the year, there will be press releases that highlight different aspects of the quarter century of Chandra science. For example, in April, two stunning time-lapse movies of Crab Nebula and Cassiopeia A data collected over nearly two decades were released. In July, there was a special release of twenty-five new Chandra images coinciding with the anniversary of launch. And, timed with the First Light anniversary, three new sonifications will be released in August.

These are just a portion of the activities and materials celebrating Chandra's 25th anniversary; for more, please visit https://chandra.si.edu/25th.

We hope you will join or have joined some of these events—or celebrate in your own way—as we celebrate this remarkable telescope and all that it has done for the past quarter century.