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Cygnus X-1

American  
[eks-wuhn] / ˈɛksˈwʌn /

noun

Astronomy.

  1. a strong x-ray source in the constellation Cygnus, consisting of a binary system of which one component may be a black hole.

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

Krawczynski noted that the 2024 flight set multiple technical milestones, including detailed measurements of both Cygnus X-1 and the Crab pulsar.

From Science Daily • Nov. 23, 2025

They spotted tiny x-ray sources, such as Cygnus X-1, each in orbit around a star.

From Science Magazine • Jan. 7, 2021

The black hole that they had confirmed was Cygnus X-1, a binary star consisting of a supermassive star co-orbiting a black hole.

From Salon • Apr. 10, 2019

But when push came to shove, Hawking bet against Cygnus X-1.

From National Geographic • Mar. 14, 2018

On the left, a visible-light image shows a region of the sky in the constellation of Cygnus; the red box marks the position of the X-ray source Cygnus X-1.

From Textbooks • Oct. 13, 2016

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.