螺旋星系NGC 6744

螺旋星系NGC 6744

ByNASA中文

2022年6月23日 Spiral Galaxy NGC 6744 Image Credit & Copyright: Basudeb Chakrabarti Explanation: Beautiful spiral galaxy NGC 6744 is nearly 175,000 light-years across, larger than our own Milky Way. It lies some 30 million light-years distant in the southern constellation Pavo but appears as only a faint, extended object in small telescopes. We see the disk of the nearby island universe tilted towards our line of sight in this remarkably detailed galaxy portrait, a telescopic view that spans an area about the angular size of a full moon. In it, the giant galaxy’s elongated yellowish core is dominated by the light from old, cool stars. Beyond the core, grand spiral arms are filled with young blue star clusters and speckled with pinkish star forming regions. An…

侧向星系NGC 4565

侧向星系NGC 4565

ByNASA中文

2022年5月26日 NGC 4565: Galaxy on Edge Image Credit & Copyright: Michael Sherick Explanation: Magnificent spiral galaxy NGC 4565 is viewed edge-on from planet Earth. Also known as the Needle Galaxy for its narrow profile, bright NGC 4565 is a stop on many telescopic tours of the northern sky, in the faint but well-groomed constellation Coma Berenices. This sharp, colorful image reveals the galaxy’s boxy, bulging central core cut by obscuring dust lanes that lace NGC 4565’s thin galactic plane. NGC 4565 itself lies about 40 million light-years distant and spans some 100,000 light-years. Easily spotted with small telescopes, sky enthusiasts consider NGC 4565 to be a prominent celestial masterpiece Messier missed. Tomorrow’s picture: pixels in space 侧向星系NGC 4565 影像提供与版权: Michael Sherick 说明: 从地球看出去，壮丽的螺旋星系NGC 4565恰好侧向着我们。因细长外观而有针状星系之名的明亮NGC 4565，是用望远镜巡礼北天昏暗北冕座时经常选定的标的。在这张清晰的彩色影像里，散布在NGC…

NGC 3521：气泡里的星系

NGC 3521：气泡里的星系

ByNASA中文

2022年5月5日 NGC 3521: Galaxy in a Bubble Image Credit & Copyright: Mark Hanson and Mike Selby Explanation: Gorgeous spiral galaxy NGC 3521 is a mere 35 million light-years away, toward the northern springtime constellation Leo. Relatively bright in planet Earth’s sky, NGC 3521 is easily visible in small telescopes but often overlooked by amateur imagers in favor of other Leo spiral galaxies, like M66 and M65. It’s hard to overlook in this colorful cosmic portrait though. Spanning some 50,000 light-years the galaxy sports characteristic patchy, irregular spiral arms laced with dust, pink star forming regions, and clusters of young, blue stars. This deep image also finds NGC 3521 embedded in fainter, gigantic, bubble-like shells. The shells are likely tidal debris, streams of stars torn from…

NGC 3628

NGC 3628

ByNASA中文

2022年4月29日 Portrait of NGC 3628 Image Credit & Copyright: Wilhelm Michael Kasakow, Olaf Guillaume Explanation: Sharp telescopic views of NGC 3628 show a puffy galactic disk divided by dark dust lanes. Of course, this portrait of the magnificent, edge-on spiral galaxy puts some astronomers in mind of its popular moniker, the Hamburger Galaxy. It also reveals a small galaxy nearby (below), likely a satellite of NGC 3628, and a very faint but extensive tidal tail. The drawn out tail stretches for about 300,000 light-years, even beyond the upper left edge of the frame. NGC 3628 shares its neighborhood in the local universe with two other large spirals M65 and M66 in a grouping otherwise known as the Leo Triplet. Gravitational interactions with its cosmic neighbors…

M104: 草帽星系

M104: 草帽星系

ByNASA中文

2022年4月23日 Messier 104 Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Hubble Legacy Archive; Processing & Copyright: Ignacio Diaz Bobillo Explanation: A gorgeous spiral galaxy, Messier 104 is famous for its nearly edge-on profile featuring a broad ring of obscuring dust lanes. Seen in silhouette against an extensive central bulge of stars, the swath of cosmic dust lends a broad brimmed hat-like appearance to the galaxy suggesting a more popular moniker, the Sombrero Galaxy. This sharp view of the well-known galaxy was made from over 10 hours of Hubble Space Telescope image data, processed to bring out faint details often lost in the overwhelming glare of M104’s bright central bulge. Also known as NGC 4594, the Sombrero galaxy can be seen across the spectrum, and is host to a…

M96

M96

ByNASA中文

2022年4月14日 Messier 96 Image Credit & Copyright: Mark Hanson and Mike Selby Explanation: Spiral arms seem to swirl around the core of Messier 96 in this colorful, detailed portrait of a beautiful island universe. Of course M96 is a spiral galaxy, and counting the faint arms extending beyond the brighter central region it spans 100 thousand light-years or so. That’s about the size of our own Milky Way. M96 is known to be 38 million light-years distant, a dominant member of the Leo I galaxy group. Background galaxies and smaller Leo I group members can be found by examining the picture. The most intriguing one is itself a spiral galaxy seen nearly edge on behind the outer spiral arm near the 1 o’clock position from…

螺旋星系NGC 2841

螺旋星系NGC 2841

ByNASA中文

2022年3月4日 Spiral Galaxy NGC 2841 Image Credit & Copyright: Vitali Pelenjow Explanation: A mere 46 million light-years distant, spiral galaxy NGC 2841 can be found in the northern constellation of Ursa Major. This deep view of the gorgeous island universe was captured during 32 clear nights in November, December 2021 and January 2022. It shows off a striking yellow nucleus, galactic disk, and faint outer regions. Dust lanes, small star-forming regions, and young star clusters are embedded in the patchy, tightly wound spiral arms. In contrast, many other spirals exhibit grand, sweeping arms with large star-forming regions. NGC 2841 has a diameter of over 150,000 light-years, even larger than our own Milky Way. X-ray images suggest that resulting winds and stellar explosions create plumes of…

IC 342：隐藏的星系

IC 342：隐藏的星系

ByNASA中文

2022年2月11日 IC 342: The Hidden Galaxy in Camelopardalis Image Credit & Copyright: Daniel Feller Explanation: Similar in size to large, bright spiral galaxies in our neighborhood, IC 342 is a mere 10 million light-years distant in the long-necked, northern constellation Camelopardalis. A sprawling island universe, IC 342 would otherwise be a prominent galaxy in our night sky, but it is hidden from clear view and only glimpsed through the veil of stars, gas and dust clouds along the plane of our own Milky Way galaxy. Even though IC 342’s light is dimmed and reddened by intervening cosmic clouds, this sharp telescopic image traces the galaxy’s own obscuring dust, young star clusters, and glowing pink star forming regions along spiral arms that wind far from the…

NGC 1566：西班牙舞者螺旋星系

NGC 1566：西班牙舞者螺旋星系

ByNASA中文

2022年1月14日 NGC 1566: The Spanish Dancer Spiral Galaxy Image Credit & Copyright: Mark Hanson and Mike Selby Explanation: An island universe of billions of stars, NGC 1566 lies about 60 million light-years away in the southern constellation Dorado. Popularly known as the Spanish Dancer galaxy, it’s seen face-on from our Milky Way perspective. A gorgeous grand design spiral, this galaxy’s two graceful spiral arms span over 100,000 light-years, traced by bright blue star clusters, pinkish starforming regions, and swirling cosmic dust lanes. NGC 1566’s flaring center makes the spiral one of the closest and brightest Seyfert galaxies. It likely houses a central supermassive black hole wreaking havoc on surrounding stars, gas, and dust. In this sharp southern galaxy portrait, the spiky stars lie well within…

M101

M101

ByNASA中文

2021年11月27日 Messier 101 Image Credit: NASA, ESA, CFHT, NOAO; Acknowledgement – K.Kuntz (GSFC), F.Bresolin (U.Hawaii), J.Trauger (JPL), J.Mould (NOAO), Y.-H.Chu (U. Illinois) Explanation: Big, beautiful spiral galaxy M101 is one of the last entries in Charles Messier’s famous catalog, but definitely not one of the least. About 170,000 light-years across, this galaxy is enormous, almost twice the size of our own Milky Way. M101 was also one of the original spiral nebulae observed by Lord Rosse’s large 19th century telescope, the Leviathan of Parsontown. Assembled from 51 exposures recorded by the Hubble Space Telescope in the 20th and 21st centuries, with additional data from ground based telescopes, this mosaic spans about 40,000 light-years across the central region of M101 in one of the highest definition…