Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer

The Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer (RXTE) satellite observes the fast-moving, high-energy worlds of black holes, neutron stars, X-ray pulsars and bursts of X-rays that light up the sky and then disappear forever.

Observations from the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer have been used as evidence for the existence of the frame-dragging effect predicted by the theory of general relativity.

In January 2006 it was announced that Rossi had been used to locate a candidate intermediate-mass black hole named M82 X-1.. In February 2006 data from RXTE was used to prove that the diffuse background x-ray glow in our galaxy comes from innumerable, previously undetected white dwarfs and from other stars' coronae.