Annihilation Fountain Images

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Mission Statement

	Fountain Simulation. Theoretical model of the fountain of annihilating antimatter electrons. The broad horizontal emission is annihilation radiation from the disk of the galaxy. The bright circular region is annihilation radiation from the galactic center. The newly discovered fountain of annihilation radiation points upward, away from the plane of the galaxy.

	Fountain/Optical. Model contours of annihilation radiation from the fountain overlaid on an optical image of our galaxy. There is no visual evidence for a fountain of hot gas near the center of our galaxy due to the large amounts of gas and dust which obscure our view in that direction.

	Fountain/Radio. Radio contours overlaid on a model of the fountain of annihilation radiation. The radio observations suggest that a channel leads from the center of our galaxy to high latitudes, in general agreement with the location and direction of the annihilation fountain.

	Galactic Center Cartoon . Cartoon illustrating the objects and variety of activities found in the galactic center region. The activity drives a fountain of hot gas laden with antimatter electrons, many of which annihilate as they travel into the galactic halo. The annihilation radiation is observed with the OSSE instrument on CGRO.