2025年2月21日
Hubble’s Andromeda Galaxy Mosaic
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Hubble Mission,
B. F. Williams (Univ Washington), Z. Chen (Univ Washington), L. C. Johnson (Northwestern),
Processing: Joseph DePasquale (STScI)
Explanation: The largest photomosaic ever assembled from Hubble Space Telescope image data is a panoramic view of our neighboring spiral Andromeda Galaxy. With 600 overlapping frames assembled from observations made from July 2010 to December 2022, the full Hubble Andromeda Galaxy mosaic spans almost six full moons across planet Earth’s sky. A cropped version shown above is nearly two full moons across and partially covers Andromeda’s core and inner spiral arms. Also known as M31, the Andromeda Galaxy is 2.5 million light-years away. That makes it the closest large spiral galaxy to our own Milky Way. Our perspective on the spiral Milky Way is anchored to the view from the location of the Sun, a star found within the Milky Way’s galactic disk. But Hubble’s magnificent Andromeda mosaic offers an expansive view of a large spiral galaxy from the outside looking in. Hubble’s comprehensive, detailed data set extending across the Andromeda Galaxy will allow astronomers to make an unprecedented holistic exploration of the mysteries of spiral galaxy structure and evolution.
Tomorrow’s picture: light-weekend
哈勃影像: 仙女座星系的拼接图
影像提供: NASA, ESA, Hubble Mission,
B. F. Williams (Univ Washington), Z. Chen (Univ Washington), L. C. Johnson (Northwestern),
影像处理: Joseph DePasquale (STScI)
说明: 这是哈勃太空望远镜迄今最大的拼接影像，主题是我们邻近的螺旋状仙女座星系。哈勃望远镜涵盖地球天空6个满月宽度的完整仙女座星系拼接全景影像，则是由2010年7月至2022年12月期间所拍摄的600张重叠照片拼接而成。上方所示的裁剪版本，只涵盖了大约2个满月的范围，聚焦仙女座星系部分的核心与螺旋臂的内围。亦名为M31的仙女座星系，距离我们约250万光年远，是离银河系最近的大螺旋星系。我们在银河系的视角，是从银河系盘面的太阳位置附近往外看，而哈勃壮丽的仙女座星系影像，则提供从外部观看大螺旋星系的独特视角。哈勃所取得的仙女座星系的详细完整数据，让天文学家有空前的机会，得以全面探索螺旋星系的结构与演化之谜。
明日的图片: light-weekend
