NGC 7814: 有超新星的小宽边帽星系

NGC 7814: 有超新星的小宽边帽星系

2021年7月22日 NGC 7814: Little Sombrero with Supernova Image Credit & Copyright: CHART32 Team, Explanation: Point your telescope toward the high flying constellation Pegasus and you can find this expanse of Milky Way stars and distant galaxies. NGC 7814 is centered in the pretty field of view that would almost be covered by a full moon. NGC 7814 is sometimes called the Little Sombrero for its resemblance to the brighter more famous M104, the Sombrero Galaxy. Both Sombrero and Little Sombrero are spiral galaxies seen edge-on, and both have extensive halos and central bulges cut by a thin disk with thinner dust lanes in silhouette. In fact, NGC 7814 is some 40 million light-years away and an estimated 60,000 light-years across. That actually makes the Little…

星系M99

星系M99

2021年06月24日 Messier 99 Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Hubble, Janice Lee; Processing & Copyright: Leo Shatz Explanation: Grand design spiral galaxy Messier 99 looks majestic on a truly cosmic scale. This recently processed full galaxy portrait stretches over 70,000 light-years across M99. The sharp view is a combination of ultraviolet, visible, and infrared image data from the Hubble Space Telescope. About 50 million light-years distant toward the well-groomed constellation Coma Bernices, the face-on spiral is a member of the nearby Virgo Galaxy Cluster. Also cataloged as NGC 4254, a close encounter with another Virgo cluster member has likely influenced the shape of its well-defined, blue spiral arms. Tomorrow’s picture: single shot Andromeda 星系M99 影像提供: NASA, ESA, Hubble, Janice Lee; 影像处理与版权: Leo Shatz 说明: 就是用宇宙的尺度来看,螺旋星系M99还是相当宏伟。这幅最近处理制作的清晰星系影像,结合了来自哈伯太空望远镜的紫外光、可见光和红外光影像数据,以呈现M99宽约70,000光年的区域。这个位在北冕座方向,约5千万光年远处的正面螺旋星系,是邻近的室女座星系团的成员之一。亦拥有NGC 4254编录号的M99,可能曾和另一个室女座星系团的成员近距离接近,因而造就了它泛蓝鲜明螺旋臂的形状。 明日的图片:…

M104:草帽星系

M104:草帽星系

2021年05月14日 M104: The Sombrero Galaxy Image Credit & Copyright: Bray Falls Explanation: A gorgeous spiral galaxy, M104 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 optical view of the well-known galaxy made from ground-based image data was processed to preserve details often lost in 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 central supermassive black hole. About 50,000 light-years across and 28 million light-years away, M104…

星系M106

星系M106

2021年04月09日 Messier 106 Image Credit: NASA, Hubble Legacy Archive, Kitt Peak National Observatory; Amateur Data & Processing Copyright: Robert Gendler Explanation: Close to the Great Bear (Ursa Major) and surrounded by the stars of the Hunting Dogs (Canes Venatici), this celestial wonder was discovered in 1781 by the metric French astronomer Pierre Mechain. Later, it was added to the catalog of his friend and colleague Charles Messier as M106. Modern deep telescopic views reveal it to be an island universe – a spiral galaxy around 30 thousand light-years across located only about 21 million light-years beyond the stars of the Milky Way. Along with a bright central core, this stunning galaxy portrait, a composite of image data from amateur and professional telescopes, highlights youthful blue…

NGC 3521:气泡里的星系

NGC 3521:气泡里的星系

2021年04月02日 NGC 3521: Galaxy in a Bubble Image Credit & Copyright: Acquisition – Eric Benson, Processing – Dietmar Hager Explanation: Gorgeous spiral galaxy NGC 3521 is a mere 35 million light-years away, toward the 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. Remarkably, this deep image also finds NGC 3521 embedded in gigantic bubble-like shells. The shells are likely tidal debris, streams of stars torn…

M64: 魔眼星系

M64: 魔眼星系

2021年03月29日 M64: The Evil Eye Galaxy Image Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA & the PHANGS-HST Team; Acknowledgement: Judy Schmidt Explanation: Who knows what evil lurks in the eyes of galaxies? The Hubble knows — or in the case of spiral galaxy M64 — is helping to find out. Messier 64, also known as the Evil Eye or Sleeping Beauty Galaxy, may seem to have evil in its eye because all of its stars rotate in the same direction as the interstellar gas in the galaxy’s central region, but in the opposite direction in the outer regions. Captured here in great detail by the Earth-orbiting Hubble Space Telescope, enormous dust clouds obscure the near-side of M64’s central region, which are laced with the telltale reddish glow of…

螺旋星系M66的哈勃影像

螺旋星系M66的哈勃影像

2021年02月24日 Spiral Galaxy M66 from Hubble Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Hubble, Janice Lee; Processing & Copyright: Leo Shatz; Text: Karen Masters Explanation: It’s always nice to get a new view of an old friend. This stunning Hubble Space Telescope image of nearby spiral galaxy M66 is just that. A spiral galaxy with a small central bar, M66 is a member of the Leo Galaxy Triplet, a group of three galaxies about 30 million light years from us. The Leo Triplet is a popular target for relatively small telescopes, in part because M66 and its galactic companions M65 and NGC 3628 all appear separated by about the angular width of a full moon. The featured image of M66 was taken by Hubble to help investigate the…

螺旋星系NGC 1350

螺旋星系NGC 1350

2021年02月12日 Spiral Galaxy NGC 1350 Image Credit & Copyright: Mike Selby, Warren Keller Explanation: This gorgeous island universe lies about 85 million light-years distant in the southern constellation Fornax. Inhabited by young blue star clusters, the tightly wound spiral arms of NGC 1350 seem to join in a circle around the galaxy’s large, bright nucleus, giving it the appearance of a cosmic eye. In fact, NGC 1350 is about 130,000 light-years across. That makes it as large or slightly larger than the Milky Way. For earth-based astronomers, NGC 1350 is seen on the outskirts of the Fornax cluster of galaxies, but its estimated distance suggests that it is not itself a cluster member. Of course, the bright spiky stars in the foreground of this telescopic…

星系M66的特写影像

星系M66的特写影像

2021年01月28日 Messier 66 Close Up Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Hubble; Processing & Copyright: Leo Shatz Explanation: Big, beautiful spiral galaxy Messier 66 lies a mere 35 million light-years away. The gorgeous island universe is about 100 thousand light-years across, similar in size to the Milky Way. This reprocessed Hubble Space Telescope close-up view spans a region about 30,000 light-years wide around the galactic core. It shows the galaxy’s disk dramatically inclined to our line-of-sight. Surrounding its bright core, the likely home of a supermassive black hole, obscuring dust lanes and young, blue star clusters sweep along spiral arms dotted with the tell-tale glow of pinksh star forming regions. Messier 66, also known as NGC 3627, is the brightest of the three galaxies in the gravitationaly…

星系NGC 5775的垂直磁场

星系NGC 5775的垂直磁场

2021年01月27日 The Vertical Magnetic Field of NGC 5775 Image Credit: NRAO, NASA, ESA, Hubble; Processing & Text: Jayanne English (U. Manitoba) Explanation: How far do magnetic fields extend up and out of spiral galaxies? For decades astronomers knew only that some spiral galaxies had magnetic fields. However, after NRAO’s Very Large Array (VLA) radio telescope (popularized in the movie Contact) was upgraded in 2011, it was unexpectedly discovered that these fields could extend vertically away from the disk by several thousand light-years. The featured image of edge-on spiral galaxy NGC 5775, observed in the CHANG-ES (Continuum Halos in Nearby Galaxies) survey, also reveals spurs of magnetic field lines that may be common in spirals. Analogous to iron filings around a bar magnet, radiation from electrons…