NGC 4826

Here's an old favorite galaxy that I'm glad to have had the chance to process some new observations for. This is also known as the Black Eye galaxy, and is among the most striking galaxies that Hubble has looked at. Previously a Hubble Heritage image release, new imagery is around 2.5 times the resolution of the old WF/PC2 imagery. That means more refined details are visible, especially If you are able to zoom all the way in. In fact, the texture of the individual stars forming even the smooth, redder, non star-forming parts the galaxy are now revealed. If you do zoom in, don't mistake that grainy, noisy texture as actual noise. Those are stars!

 

I went ahead and did use some old WFPC2 data just to show glowing hydrogen gas. This usually works well without lowering the image quality, despite the disparity in resolution.

 

Data from the following proposals were used to create this image:

PHANGS-HST: Linking Stars and Gas throughout the Scales of Star Formation

The Smallest Nuclear Black Holes

 

Red: WFC3/UVIS F814W+WFPC2 F656N

Green: WFC3/UVIS F555W

Blue: WFC3/UVIS F438W+F336W+F275W

 

North is 142.85° clockwise from up.

Done