View allAll Photos Tagged GALEX
Shya looks on in stunned amazement as Galex coaxes the young dragon to come land on his hand.
Taken in Dragonia
There's a new unnamed harpy in the mix; I don't know much about him yet aside from the fact that Galex and Shya don't seem to want him around....
Taken in Prehistorica
maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Prehistorica%20Creche/220/...
Galex grabs a bottle off the shelf and turns to Shya who is busy stirring the cauldron.
"I can't tell the unicorn tears from the ogre sweat? Which one is this?" he asks holding up a bottle.
Exasperated, Shya mutters under her breath, "This grimlock can track any beast in the forrest without issue but put him in a kitchen and he's as useless as a baby trigor..."
Then, slightly louder for Galex to hear, Shya says "Neither, dear. You're holding a bottle of centaur spit and if you add that to this potion it'll make the whole thing inert!"
Taken in Necturn Moon - when I stumbled across the scene suddenly the picture had to be created...
This Jan. 10, 2013, composite image of the giant barred spiral galaxy NGC 6872 combines visible light images from the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope with far-ultraviolet data from NASA's Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) and infrared data acquired by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. NGC 6872 is 522,000 light-years across, making it more than five times the size of the Milky Way galaxy. In 2013, astronomers from the United States, Chile, and Brazil found it to be the largest-known spiral galaxy, based on archival data from GALEX.
Image Credit: NASA/ESO/JPL-Caltech/DSS
#NASA #NASAMarshall #JPL #JetPropulsionLaboratory #SpitzerSpaceTelescope #Spitzer #GALEX #galaxy
The Blue Ring Nebula, which perplexed scientists for over a decade, appears to be the youngest known example of two stars merged into one.
In 2004, scientists with NASA's space-based Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) spotted an object unlike any they'd seen before in our Milky Way galaxy: a large, faint blob of gas with a star at its center. In the GALEX images, the blob appeared blue – though it doesn't actually emit light visible to the human eye – and subsequent observations revealed a thick ring structure within it. So the team nicknamed it the Blue Ring Nebula. Over the next 16 years, they studied it with multiple Earth- and space-based telescopes, but the more they learned, the more mysterious it seemed.
A new study published online on Nov. 18 in the journal Nature may have cracked the case. By applying cutting-edge theoretical models to the slew of data that has been collected on this object, the authors posit the nebula – a cloud of gas in space – is likely composed of debris from two stars that collided and merged into a single star.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/M. Seibert (Carnegie Institution for Science)/K. Hoadley (Caltech)/GALEX Team
#NASA #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #MSFC #Marshall #astronomy #space #astrophysics #solarsystemandbeyond #GalaxyEvolutionExplorer #BlueRingNebula #nebula
Believe it or not, this long, glowing streak, speckled with bright blisters and pockets of material, is a spiral galaxy like our Milky Way. But how could that be?
It turns out that we see this galaxy, named NGC 3432, oriented directly edge-on to us from our vantage point here on Earth. The galaxy’s spiral arms and bright core are hidden, and we instead see the thin strip of its very outer reaches. Dark bands of cosmic dust, patches of varying brightness and pink regions of star formation help with making out the true shape of NGC 3432 — but it’s still somewhat of a challenge! Because observatories such as the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have seen spiral galaxies at every kind of orientation, astronomers can tell when we happen to have caught one from the side.
The galaxy is located in the constellation of Leo Minor (the Lesser Lion). Other telescopes that have had NGC 3432 in their sights include those of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, the Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) and the Infrared Astronomical Satellite (IRAS).
Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, A. Filippenko, R. Jansen
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Believe it or not, this long, luminous streak, speckled with bright blisters and pockets of material, is a spiral galaxy like our Milky Way. But how could that be?
It turns out that we see this galaxy, named NGC 3432, orientated directly edge-on to us from our vantage point here on Earth. The galaxy’s spiral arms and bright core are hidden, and we instead see the thin strip of its very outer reaches. Dark bands of cosmic dust, patches of varying brightness, and pink regions of star formation help with making out the true shape of NGC 3432 — but it’s still somewhat of a challenge! Because observatories such as the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have seen spiral galaxies at every kind of orientation, astronomers can tell when we happen to have caught one from the side.
The galaxy is located in the constellation of Leo Minor (The Lesser Lion). Other telescopes that have had NGC 3432 in their sights include those of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, the Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX), and the Infrared Astronomical Satellite (IRAS).
Credits: ESA/Hubble & NASA, A. Filippenko, R. Jansen; CC BY 4.0
NGC 3023 and NGC 3018 are a pair of galaxies in Sextans. The system is interesting because of the presence of Markarian (Mrk) 1236 - an intensely bright blue/ultraviolet source appearing within NGC 3023. Although unclear, it is believed to be a very active giant star forming region. The spectrum of Mrk 1236 resembles that of a Wolf-Rayet star, suggesting very recent star formation (within the past few million years before this light was emitted). NGC 3023 and NGC 3018 appear to be interacting and this would explain the vigorous star formation and considerable UV activity as recorded by GALEX. Both galaxies show distorted spiral arms and were probably barred spiral galaxies before their interactions started. They are about 31.2 megaparsecs (or about 102 million light years) from Earth. Despite extensive searches I have been unable to find any deep images of these targets, and thus believe this image to be the first.
Thanks to Owen Brazell for providing the technical details on these galaxies.
Data captured on my remote observatory in Spain.
Scopes: APM TMB LZOS 152 Refractors
Cameras: QSI6120wsg8
Mounts: 10Micron GM2000 HPS
A total of 10 hours 5 minutes (LRGB)
More information at www.imagingdeepspace.com/ngc-3023.html
GALEX - www.galex.caltech.edu/media/images/glx2012-01r_img01.jpg
Images of the Cygnus Loop - imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/Images/rosat/snr_cygloop.html
Michael L Hyde (c) 2014
The spiral galaxy known as Messier 81 (M81) has a rosy tint in this June 1, 2007, composite image that incorporates data from NASA’s Spitzer and Hubble Space Telescopes, and NASA’s Galaxy Evolution Explorer. Discovered by the German astronomer Johann Elert Bode in 1774, M81 is one of the brightest galaxies in the night sky. It is located 11.6 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Ursa Major.
The galaxy’s spiral arms, which wind all the way down into its nucleus, are made up of young, bluish, hot stars formed in the past few million years. They also host a population of stars formed in an episode of star formation that started about 600 million years ago.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ESA/Harvard-Smithsonian CfA
#NASAMarshall #NASA #NASAHubble #Hubble #NASAGoddard #galaxy #NASASpitzer
A planet may have been destroyed by a white dwarf at the center of a planetary nebula — the first time this has been seen. As described in our latest press release, this would explain a mysterious X-ray signal that astronomers have detected from the Helix Nebula for over 40 years. The Helix is a planetary nebula, a late-stage star like our Sun that has shed its outer layers leaving a small dim star at its center called a white dwarf.
This composite image contains X-rays from Chandra (magenta), optical light data from Hubble (orange, light blue), infrared data from ESO (gold, dark blue), and ultraviolet data from GALEX (purple) of the Helix Nebula. Data from Chandra indicates that this white dwarf has destroyed a very closely orbiting planet.
Visual description: The Helix Nebula is a cloud of gas ejected by a dying star, known as a white dwarf. In this composite image, the cloud of gas strongly resembles a creature's eye. Here, a hazy blue cloud is surrounded by misty, concentric rings of pale yellow, rose pink, and blood orange. Each ring appears dusted with flecks of gold, particularly the outer edges of the eye-shape.
The entire image is speckled with glowing dots in blues, whites, yellows, and purples. At the center of the hazy blue gas cloud is a bright white dot with a pink outer ring and a smaller white dot.
Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO/Univ Mexico/S. Estrada-Dorado et al.; Ultraviolet: NASA/JPL; Optical: NASA/ESA/STScI (M. Meixner)/NRAO (T.A. Rector); Infrared: ESO/VISTA/J. Emerson; Image Processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/K. Arcand;
This image of the nearby spiral galaxy NGC 300 was taken by Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) in a single orbit exposure of 27 minutes. NGC 300 lies 7 million light years from our Milky Way galaxy and is one of a group of galaxies in the constellation Sculptor. NGC 300 is often used as a prototype of a spiral galaxy because in optical images it displays flowing spiral arms and a bright central region of older (and thus redder) stars.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Image Number: PIA04924
Date: October 10, 2003
The Andromeda galaxy, also known as Messier 31 (M31), is the closest spiral galaxy to the Milky Way at a distance of about 2.5 million light-years. Astronomers use Andromeda to understand the structure and evolution of our own spiral, which is much harder to do since Earth is embedded inside the Milky Way.
The galaxy M31 has played an important role in many aspects of astrophysics, but particularly in the discovery of dark matter. In the 1960s, astronomer Vera Rubin and her colleagues studied M31 and determined that there was some unseen matter in the galaxy that was affecting how the galaxy and its spiral arms rotated. This unknown material was named “dark matter.” Its nature remains one of the biggest open questions in astrophysics today, one which NASA’s upcoming Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope is designed to help answer.
This new image of M31 is released in tribute to the groundbreaking legacy of Dr. Vera Rubin, whose observations transformed our understanding of the universe.
Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXO/UMass/Z. Li & Q.D. Wang, ESA/XMM-Newton; Infrared: NASA/JPL-Caltech/WISE, Spitzer, NASA/JPL-Caltech/K. Gordon (U. Az), ESA/Herschel, ESA/Planck, NASA/IRAS, NASA/COBE; Radio: NSF/GBT/WSRT/IRAM/C. Clark (STScI); Ultraviolet: NASA/JPL-Caltech/GALEX; Optical: Andromeda, Unexpected © Marcel Drechsler, Xavier Strottner, Yann Sainty & J. Sahner, T. Kottary. Composite image processing: L. Frattare, K. Arcand, J.Major
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This image of the Pinwheel Galaxy, or also known as M101, combines data in the infrared, visible, ultraviolet and X-rays from four of NASA's space-based telescopes. This multi-spectral view shows that both young and old stars are evenly distributed along M101's tightly-wound spiral arms. Such composite images allow astronomers to see how features in one part of the spectrum match up with those seen in other parts. It is like seeing with a regular camera, an ultraviolet camera, night-vision goggles and X-ray vision, all at the same time.
The Pinwheel Galaxy is in the constellation of Ursa Major (also known as the Big Dipper). It is about 70 percent larger than our own Milky Way Galaxy, with a diameter of about 170,000 light years, and sits at a distance of 21 million light years from Earth. This means that the light we're seeing in this image left the Pinwheel Galaxy about 21 million years ago - many millions of years before humans ever walked the Earth.
The hottest and most energetic areas in this composite image are shown in purple, where the Chandra X-ray Observatory observed the X-ray emission from exploded stars, million-degree gas, and material colliding around black holes.
The red colors in the image show infrared light, as seen by the Spitzer Space Telescope. These areas show the heat emitted by dusty lanes in the galaxy, where stars are forming.
The yellow component is visible light, observed by the Hubble Space Telescope. Most of this light comes from stars, and they trace the same spiral structure as the dust lanes seen in the infrared.
The blue areas are ultraviolet light, given out by hot, young stars that formed about one million years ago, captured by the Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX).
Read entire caption/view more images: chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2012/m101/
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO; IR & UV: NASA/JPL-Caltech; Optical: NASA/STScI
Caption credit: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Read more about Chandra:
p.s. You can see all of our Chandra photos in the Chandra Group in Flickr at: www.flickr.com/groups/chandranasa/ We'd love to have you as a member!
_____________________________________________
These official NASA photographs are being made available for publication by news organizations and/or for personal use printing by the subject(s) of the photographs. The photographs may not be used in materials, advertisements, products, or promotions that in any way suggest approval or endorsement by NASA. All Images used must be credited. For information on usage rights please visit: www.nasa.gov/audience/formedia/features/MP_Photo_Guidelin...
Chandra Celebrates the International Year of Light
This galaxy, nicknamed the “Whirlpool,” is a spiral galaxy, like our Milky Way, located about 30 million light years from Earth. This composite image combines data collected at X-ray wavelengths by Chandra (purple), ultraviolet by the Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX, blue); visible light by Hubble (green), and infrared by Spitzer (red).
Image Credit: NASA/CXC/SAO
Read full article:
www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/chandra/celebrate-intl-year-of-light.html
SB 74 JSK
Mercedes-Benz Actros 1851 BigSpace
Galex Transport, Dumbraveni, Romania
Buckingham, 1 April 2021
This computer-simulated image shows gas from a star that is ripped apart by tidal forces as it falls into a black hole. Some of the gas also is being ejected at high speeds into space.
Using observations from telescopes in space and on the ground, astronomers have gathered the most direct evidence yet for this violent process: a supermassive black hole shredding a star that wandered too close. NASA's orbiting Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) and the Pan-STARRS1 telescope on the summit of Haleakala in Hawaii were used to help to identify the stellar remains.
A flare in ultraviolet and optical light revealed gas falling into the black hole as well as helium-rich gas that was expelled from the system. When the star is torn apart, some of the material falls into the black hole, while the rest is ejected at high speeds. The flare and its properties provide a signature of this scenario and give unprecedented details about the stellar victim.
To completely rule out the possibility of an active nucleus flaring up in the galaxy instead of a star being torn apart, the team used NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory to study the hot gas. Chandra showed that the characteristics of the gas didn't match those from an active galactic nucleus.
The galaxy where the supermassive black hole ripped apart the passing star in known as PS1-10jh and is located about 2.7 billion light years from Earth. Astronomers estimate the black hole in PS1-10jh has a mass of several million suns, which is comparable to the supermassive black hole in our own Milky Way galaxy.
Read entire caption/view more images: www.chandra.si.edu/photo/2012/ps1/
Credit: NASA, S. Gezari (The Johns Hopkins University), and J. Guillochon (University of California, Santa Cruz)
Read entire caption/view more images: www.chandra.si.edu/photo/2012/ps1/
Caption credit: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Read more about Chandra:
p.s. You can see all of our Chandra photos in the Chandra Group in Flickr at: www.flickr.com/groups/chandranasa/ We'd love to have you as a member!
_____________________________________________
These official NASA photographs are being made available for publication by news organizations and/or for personal use printing by the subject(s) of the photographs. The photographs may not be used in materials, advertisements, products, or promotions that in any way suggest approval or endorsement by NASA. All Images used must be credited. For information on usage rights please visit: www.nasa.gov/audience/formedia/features/MP_Photo_Guidelin...
VV 340, also known as Arp 302, provides a textbook example of colliding galaxies seen in the early stages of their interaction. The edge-on galaxy near the top of the image is VV 340 North and the face-on galaxy at the bottom of the image is VV 340 South. Millions of years later these two spirals will merge -- much like the Milky Way and Andromeda will likely do billions of years from now. Data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory (purple) are shown here along with optical data from the Hubble Space Telescope (red, green, blue). VV 340 is located about 450 million light years from Earth.
Because it is bright in infrared light, VV 340 is classified as a Luminous Infrared Galaxy (LIRG). These observations are part of the Great Observatories All-Sky LIRG Survey (GOALS) combining data from Chandra, Hubble, NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) and ground-based telescopes. The survey includes over two hundred LIRGs in the local Universe. A chief motivation of this study is to understand why LIRGs emit so much infrared radiation. These galaxies generate energy at a rate this is tens to hundreds of times larger than that emitted by a typical galaxy. An actively growing supermassive black hole or an intense burst of star formation is often invoked as the most likely source of the energy.
Work on the full GOALS survey is ongoing, but preliminary analysis of data for VV 340 provides a good demonstration of the power of observing with multiple observatories. The Chandra data show that the center of VV 340 North likely contains a rapidly growing supermassive black hole that is heavily obscured by dust and gas. The infared emission of the galaxy pair, as observed by Spitzer, is dominated by VV 340 North, and also provides evidence for a growing supermassive black hole. However, only a small fraction of the infrared emission is generated by this black hole.
By contrast most of the ultraviolet and short wavelength optical emission in the galaxy pair -- as observed by GALEX and HST -- comes from VV 340 South. This shows that VV 340 South contains a much higher level of star formation. (The Spitzer and GALEX images are not shown here because they strongly overlap with the optical and X-ray images, but they are shown in a separate composite image.) VV 340 appears to be an excellent example of a pair of interacting galaxies evolving at different rates.
These results on VV 340 were published in the June 2009 issue of the Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. The lead author was Lee Armus from the Spitzer Science Center in Pasadena, CA.
Credit: X-ray NASA/CXC/IfA/D.Sanders et al; Optical NASA/STScI/NRAO/A.Evans et al
Read entire caption/view more images: chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2011/vv340/
Caption credit: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
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p.s. You can see all of our Chandra photos in the Chandra Group in Flickr at: www.flickr.com/groups/chandranasa/ We'd love to have you as a member!
Just in time for Valentine's Day comes a new image of a ring -- not of jewels -- but of black holes. This composite image of Arp 147, a pair of interacting galaxies located about 430 million light years from Earth, shows X-rays from the NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory (pink) and optical data from the Hubble Space Telescope (red, green, blue) produced by the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, Md.
Arp 147 contains the remnant of a spiral galaxy (right) that collided with the elliptical galaxy on the left. This collision has produced an expanding wave of star formation that shows up as a blue ring containing in abundance of massive young stars. These stars race through their evolution in a few million years or less and explode as supernovas, leaving behind neutron stars and black holes.
A fraction of the neutron stars and black holes will have companion stars, and may become bright X-ray sources as they pull in matter from their companions. The nine X-ray sources scattered around the ring in Arp 147 are so bright that they must be black holes, with masses that are likely ten to twenty times that of the Sun.
An X-ray source is also detected in the nucleus of the red galaxy on the left and may be powered by a poorly-fed supermassive black hole. This source is not obvious in the composite image but can easily be seen in the X-ray image. Other objects unrelated to Arp 147 are also visible: a foreground star in the lower left of the image and a background quasar as the pink source above and to the left of the red galaxy.
Infrared observations with NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and ultraviolet observations with NASA's Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) have allowed estimates of the rate of star formation in the ring. These estimates, combined with the use of models for the evolution of binary stars have allowed the authors to conclude that the most intense star formation may have ended some 15 million years ago, in Earth's time frame.
These results were published in the October 1st, 2010 issue of The Astrophysical Journal. The authors were Saul Rappaport and Alan Levine from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, David Pooley from Eureka Scientific and Benjamin Steinhorn, also from MIT.
NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., manages the Chandra program for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory controls Chandra's science and flight operations from Cambridge, Mass.
Credits: X-ray: NASA/CXC/MIT/S.Rappaport et al, Optical: NASA/STScI
Read entire caption/view more images: chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2011/arp147/
Caption credit: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Read more about Chandra:
p.s. You can see all of our Chandra photos in the Chandra Group in Flickr at: www.flickr.com/groups/chandranasa/ We'd love to have you as a member!
This composite NASA image of the spiral galaxy M81, located about 12 million light years away, includes X-ray data from the Chandra X-ray Observatory (blue), optical data from the Hubble Space Telescope (green), infrared data from the Spitzer Space Telescope (pink) and ultraviolet data from GALEX (purple). The inset shows a close-up of the Chandra image. At the center of M81 is a supermassive black hole that is about 70 million times more massive than the Sun.
A new study using data from Chandra and ground-based telescopes, combined with detailed theoretical models, shows that the supermassive black hole in M81 feeds just like stellar mass black holes, with masses of only about ten times that of the Sun. This discovery supports the implication of Einstein's relativity theory that black holes of all sizes have similar properties, and will be useful for predicting the properties of a conjectured new class of black holes.
Image Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/Wisconsin/D.Pooley and CfA/A.Zezas; Optical: NASA/ESA/CfA/A.Zezas; UV: NASA/JPL-Caltech/CfA/J.Huchra et al.; IR: NASA/JPL-Caltech/CfA
Learn more/access larger images:
www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/chandra/multimedia/photos08-07...
p.s. You can see all of our Chandra photos in the Chandra Group in Flickr at: www.flickr.com/groups/chandranasa/ We'd love to have you as a member!
The image on the left shows the newly discovered Phoenix Cluster, located about 5.7 billion light years from Earth. This composite includes an X-ray image from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory in purple, an optical image from the 4m Blanco telescope in red, green and blue, and an ultraviolet (UV) image from NASA's Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) in blue. The Chandra data reveal hot gas in the cluster and the optical and UV images show galaxies in the cluster and in nearby parts of the sky.
This galaxy cluster has been dubbed the "Phoenix Cluster" because it is located in the constellation of the Phoenix, and because of its remarkable properties, as explained here and in our press release. Stars are forming in the Phoenix Cluster at the highest rate ever observed for the middle of a galaxy cluster. The object is also the most powerful producer of X-rays of any known cluster, and among the most massive of clusters. The data also suggest that the rate of hot gas cooling in the central regions of the cluster is the largest ever observed.
Like other galaxy clusters, Phoenix contains a vast reservoir of hot gas -- containing more normal matter than all of the galaxies in the cluster combined -- that can only be detected with X-ray telescopes like Chandra. This hot gas is giving off copious amounts of X-rays and cooling quickly over time, especially near the center of the cluster, causing gas to flow inwards and form huge numbers of stars.
These features of the central galaxy are shown in the artist's illustration, with hot gas in red, cooler gas as blue, the gas flows shown by the ribbon-like features and the newly formed stars in blue. An animation [link to animation] shows the process of cooling and star formation in action. A close-up of the middle of the optical and UV image [link to optical/UV close-up] shows that the central galaxy has much bluer colors than the nearby galaxies in the cluster, showing the presence of large numbers of hot, massive stars forming.
These results are striking because most galaxy clusters have formed very few stars over the last few billion years. Astronomers think that the supermassive black hole in the central galaxy of clusters pumps energy into the system. The famous Perseus Cluster is an example of a black hole bellowing out energy and preventing the gas from cooling to form stars at a high rate. Repeated outbursts from the black hole in the center of Perseus, in the form of powerful jets, created giant cavities and produced sound waves with an incredibly deep B-flat note 57 octaves below middle C. Shock waves, akin to sonic booms in Earth's atmosphere, and the very deep sound waves release energy into the gas in Perseus, preventing most of it from cooling.
In the case of Phoenix, jets from the giant black hole in its central galaxy are not powerful enough to prevent the cluster gas from cooling. Correspondingly, any deep notes produced by the jets must be much weaker than needed to prevent cooling and star formation.
Based on the Chandra data and also observations at other wavelengths, the supermassive black hole in the central galaxy of Phoenix is growing very quickly, at a rate of about 60 times the mass of the Sun every year. This rate is unsustainable, because the black hole is already very massive, with a mass of about 20 billion times the mass of the Sun. Therefore, its growth spurt cannot last much longer than about a hundred million years or it would become much bigger than its counterparts in the nearby Universe. A similar argument applies to the growth of the central galaxy. Eventually powerful jets should be produced by the black hole in repeated outbursts, forming the deep notes seen in objects like Perseus and stopping the starburst.
Read entire caption/view more images: chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2012/phoenix/
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/MIT/M.McDonald; UV: NASA/JPL-Caltech/M.McDonald; Optical: AURA/NOAO/CTIO/MIT/M.McDonald; Illustration: NASA/CXC/M.Weiss
Caption credit: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Read more about Chandra:
p.s. You can see all of our Chandra photos in the Chandra Group in Flickr at: www.flickr.com/groups/chandranasa/ We'd love to have you as a member!
_____________________________________________
These official NASA photographs are being made available for publication by news organizations and/or for personal use printing by the subject(s) of the photographs. The photographs may not be used in materials, advertisements, products, or promotions that in any way suggest approval or endorsement by NASA. All Images used must be credited. For information on usage rights please visit: www.nasa.gov/audience/formedia/features/MP_Photo_Guidelin...
UGC 4277 Distant Galaxy Group, Lynx
UGC4277 is a giant edge-on spiral galaxy, morphological type SC, which is gravitationally bound to, but not tidally interacting with, two smaller galaxies, MCG+09-14-017 and MCG+09-14-012. Since they have similar redshifts and distances, their relative sizes and separation on the image are essentially to scale. From the measurable properties (redshift, apparent magnitude, and angular size), we can derive UGC4277 light travel distance (lookback time) of 250 Mly, redshift recession velocity of 5,407 km/s, and actual diameter of 284,000 ly. This is about 30% larger than the Andromeda Galaxy, and nearly twice the size of the Milky Way. Due to its edge-on orientation, its integrated apparent magnitude and the calculated absolute magnitude are significantly underestimated for two reasons. First, it presents to the observer a much smaller surface area than a face-on galaxy. And second, much of its starlight is absorbed and scattered by thick layers of gas and dust in its galactic plane. Prominent dark dust lanes are easily visible even at the low resolution and small scale of the attached image. UGC4277 has an active galactic nucleus (AGN), which indicates the presence of an accreting central supermassive black hole (SMBH.
Edge-on galaxies are of great interest in the study of galactic evolution because the dynamic distribution of stars, dust, and atomic gas can be analyzed both along the galactic plane and perpendicularly to it. Radio frequency studies of UGC4277 by Allaert et al. (2015) revealed the presence of a primordial atomic hydrogen envelope, three times thicker than the visible disk. As this gas gravitates toward the galactic plane, it condenses into clouds of molecular gas, which eventually collapse to form a "rain" of low metallicity stars. Metals (in astronomy all elements heavier that helium) are produced by stellar nucleosynthesis, and are dispersed into the interstellar medium (ISM) by stellar winds, supernova explosions, and neutron star collisions. Through various processes, a fraction of metals condenses into small dust grains which on average constitute about 0.1% of the galactic baryonic mass. While most of the dust resides in the galactic plane, a part of it can be detected in the form of a "dust-scattered ultraviolet halo" around the galaxy. This "extraplanar" dust appears to be defying gravity, probably suspended by radiation pressure and the plumes of hot gases arising from the galactic disk and bulge. Assuming similar total dust mass fraction, it is expected that starburst galaxies with numerous hot, blue stars and more intense ultraviolet radiation would manifest more prominent extraplanar dust halos. Jong-Ho Shinn (2018), who compared visible band to GALEX ultraviolet images of 23 edge-on galaxies reported, among other findings, a moderate to low extraplanar dust halo around UGC4277, implying a similarly moderate to low star formation rate.
The other two galaxies in the group are MCG+09-14-017 and MCG+09-14-012. The former is oriented face-on, and has a LINER type active galactic nucleus. It is approximately half the diameter and half the brightness of the Milky Way. Both appear to be barred spirals with slightly deformed spiral arms probably due to mild tidal interaction in the remote past. A number of small, background galaxies, listed in the chart on the annotated image, lie at distances between 540 and 1,610 million light years. Four bright quasars are also identified. The most remote of these is SDSS J081428.78+524045.2, located at a light travel distance (lookback time) of 10.4 billion light years. In the present cosmological epoch, its proper (comoving) distance is 17 Bly, and proper recesion velocity 367,941 km/s. Since its recession velocity is presently superluminal, the quasar lies beyond the cosmic event horizon, and the light it is presently emitting can never reach us.
Image details:
-Remote Takahashi TOA 150 x 1105 mm, Paramount GT GEM
-OSC 35 x 300 sec, 2x drizzle, 50% linear crop
-Software: DSS, XnView, Starnet++ v2, StarTools v1.3 and 1.7, Cosmological Calculator v3
Description: A composite image of M51, also known as the Whirlpool Galaxy, shows a majestic spiral galaxy. Chandra finds point-like X-ray sources (purple) that are black holes and neutron stars in binary star systems, along with a diffuse glow of hot gas. Data from Hubble (green) and Spitzer (red) both highlight long lanes of stars and gas laced with dust. A view of M51 with GALEX shows hot, young stars that produce lots of ultraviolet energy (blue).
Creator/Photographer: Chandra X-ray Observatory
NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, which was launched and deployed by Space Shuttle Columbia on July 23, 1999, is the most sophisticated X-ray observatory built to date. The mirrors on Chandra are the largest, most precisely shaped and aligned, and smoothest mirrors ever constructed. Chandra is helping scientists better understand the hot, turbulent regions of space and answer fundamental questions about origin, evolution, and destiny of the Universe. The images Chandra makes are twenty-five times sharper than the best previous X-ray telescope. NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., manages the Chandra program for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory controls Chandra science and flight operations from the Chandra X-ray Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Medium: Chandra telescope x-ray
Date: 2007
Persistent URL: chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2007/m51/
Repository: Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
Gift line: X-ray: NASA/CXC/Wesleyan Univ./R.Kilgard et al; UV: NASA/JPL-Caltech; Optical: NASA/ESA/S. Beckwith & Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA); IR: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ Univ. of AZ/R. Kennicutt
Accession number: m51
Editor's note: this is an alternate view of the Chandra image located on this prior post, www.flickr.com/photos/28634332@N05/5431801240/, entitled "A Ring of Black Holes." Full caption and credit information can be found on this earlier page.
This composite image of Arp 147 shows Chandra X-ray data in pink, Hubble optical data in red, green and blue, ultraviolet GALEX data in green and infrared Spitzer data in red.
Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/MIT/S.Rappaport et al, Optical: NASA/STScI
Read entire caption/view more images: chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2007/orion/
Caption credit: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Read more about Chandra:
p.s. You can see all of our Chandra photos in the Chandra Group in Flickr at: www.flickr.com/groups/chandranasa/ We'd love to have you as a member!
Description Artist's concept of GALEX (Galaxy Evolution Explorer): launched April 28, 2003.
GALEX was an ultraviolet light telescope that was launched by an air launched Pegasus rocket. Its main purpose was to study the formation of galaxies. GALEX was equipped with instruments that allowed astronomers to observe thousands of different galaxies. GALEX was operated by NASA until early 2012, then control was transferred to Caltech. The telescope was decommissioned in 2013.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Image Number: glx2004-01r_img01
Date December 21, 2004
Description: This composite image of M101 (aka, the "Pinwheel Galaxy") combines data from four of NASA's space-based telescopes. X-rays from Chandra (purple) reveal the hottest and most energetic areas due to exploded stars, superheated gas, and material falling toward black holes. Infrared data from Spitzer (red) shows dusty lanes in the galaxy where stars are forming, while Hubble data (yellow) traces the light from stars. Ultraviolet emission detected by GALEX (blue) shows emission from young stars.
Creator: Chandra X-ray Observatory Center
Date Created: 5/24/2012
Repository: Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
Image ID: m101
Permanent URL: chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2012/m101/
New results based on the two objects shown here are challenging the prevailing ideas as to how supermassive black holes grow in the centers of galaxies. NGC 4342 and NGC 4291, the two galaxies in the study, are nearby in cosmic terms at distances of 75 million and 85 million light years respectively. In these composite images, X-rays from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory are colored blue, while infrared data from the 2MASS project are seen in red.
Astronomers had known from previous observations that these galaxies host black holes with unusually large masses compared to the mass contained in the central bulge of stars. To study the dark matter envelopes contained in each galaxy, Chandra was used to examine their hot gas content, which was found to be widespread in both objects.
By analyzing the distribution of the hot gas, researchers were able to test whether the galaxies had "lost weight" through stars being pulled away during a tidal encounter with another galaxy. Estimates of the pressure of the hot gas, which must balance the gravitational pull of all the matter in the galaxy, showed that massive envelopes of dark matter must exist around each galaxy. Since this tidal stripping would have severely depleted the dark matter, which is more loosely tied to the galaxies than the stars, this process is unlikely to have occurred in either galaxy.
The new results using NGC 4342 and NGC 4291 challenge the long-held idea that black holes at the centers of galaxies always grow in tandem with the bulges of stars that surround them. Rather this study suggests that the two supermassive black holes and their evolution are tied more closely to the amount and distribution of dark matter in each galaxy. In this picture the weights of the black hole and the dark matter envelope in these two galaxies are "normal" and the galaxies are underweight because they formed unusually slowly.
Read entire caption/view more images: chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2012/ngc4342/
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO/A.Bogdan et al; Infrared: 2MASS/UMass/IPAC-Caltech/NASA/NSF
Caption credit: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Read more about Chandra:
p.s. You can see all of our Chandra photos in the Chandra Group in Flickr at: www.flickr.com/groups/chandranasa/ We'd love to have you as a member!
_____________________________________________
These official NASA photographs are being made available for publication by news organizations and/or for personal use printing by the subject(s) of the photographs. The photographs may not be used in materials, advertisements, products, or promotions that in any way suggest approval or endorsement by NASA. All Images used must be credited. For information on usage rights please visit: www.nasa.gov/audience/formedia/features/MP_Photo_Guidelin...
NGC 7479, Caldwell 44, Pegasus, Propeller Galaxy
NGC7479 is a distorted barred spiral galaxy in the constellation of Pegasus, discovered by W. Herschel in 1784. With apparent diameter of 4.4 arcmin, and apparent magnitude of 10.85 (V), visual observation calls for large apertures. However, its basic structures are evident photographically with modest telescopes. From its measurable properties we can derive light travel distance (lookback time) of 110 million light years, redshift recession velocity of 2,379 km/s, actual diameter of 140,000 ly, and absolute magnitude of -21.83 (V), approximately 1.5 times as bright as the Milky Way. NGC7479 has an active galactic nucleus (AGN) which is 8.5 times brighter in the near IR (z filter) than in the visible band, and which emits narrow spectral lines of weakly ionized elements. These characteristics classify it as a Seyfert 2 and a LINER galaxy. It is powered by an actively accreting central supermassive black hole (SMBH) obscured by a large, dense cloud of light-absobing gas and dust. The nucleus is also active at radio frequencies, suggesting the SMBH has polar jets emitting synchrotron radiation. Bright blue floccules in the spiral arms and even within the bar are OB Associations, or vast clusters of recently formed blue giant stars which emit most of their energy in the ultraviolet band. NGC7479 is an isolated field galaxy with no nearby neighbors. Starburst activity, several stellar streams, and gravitational distortion in the W spiral arm are thought to have been caused by a merger with one or more dwarf satellite galaxies between 300 and 100 million years ago.
As the annotated image illustrates, different spectral bands reveal different details within a galaxy. In the ultraviolet band (GALEX), the most prominent features are OB associations, starburst regions, and reflection nebulae. The compact, round UV signal overlapping the N arm of the bar may be the remnant nucleus of a merged dwarf galaxy. The NGC7479 nucleus is not prominent because it is surrounded by a thick layer of gas and dust which absorb and scatter predominantly UV light. However, the brightest feature on the infrared (2MASS) image of the galaxy is precisely the main galactic nucleus with a central SMBH, because longer wavelengths are less obsured. The bulge and the bar are also distinctive due to the presence of ancient cool and red Population II stars. Radio frequency imaging of the galaxy reveals the presence of a bright jet-like feature, centered on the nucleus, and extending through the bar about 20,000 light years in the N and in the S direction. The jet's spiral morphology mildly curves in the direction opposite to that of the stellar and gaseous spiral arms, suggesting that the two structures may be counter-rotating. Jet bending can be caused by precession of the central SMBH accretion disk, by the presence of a binary central SMBH, and/or an off center merger with another galaxy. Based on the rate of expansion and the maximum distance from the nucleus, the jet is felt to be less than 10 million years old.
A large galaxy cluster is visible in the remote background at an estimated light travel distance of 1.5 to 2 billion light years. Only two of these have assigned identifiers. Their measurable and derived properties are listed in the chart on the annotated image.
Image details:
-Remote Takahashi TOA 150 x 1105 mm, Paramount GT GEM,
-OSC 34 x 300 sec, 2x drizzle, 50% linear crop,
-Software: DSS, XnView, StarNet++ v2, StarTools v1.3 and 1.7, Cosmological Calculator v3
I have recently turned my attention to some archival GALEX data and found it quite promising. What surprised me the most was the presence of galactic cirrus in the FUV (far ultraviolet) channel. Because I am unfamiliar with the "personality" of the telescope I almost mistook it for some kind of odd artifacting. As far as I know, this cirrus has never been presented in a GALEX image before, so I am happy to have found it there. If you are having a hard time seeing it, a brighter version is available here (6.7MB JPG).
Processing notes: Of greatest concern is the FUV-bright star (Nu Andromedae) in the lower left. There was no FUV data available; all came from a single, low duration NUV (near ultraviolet) exposure. The brightness of the star was interpolated based on nearby contextual clues from frames which did contain FUV information. It is definitely the brightest FUV source in the frame, and I think it was fair to "fake" it like this. From what I am able to gather, observations of bright FUV sources were avoided due to long-term issues with the detectors, so that is probably why there were never any exposures of this particular star.
Several areas are monochrome like this, mostly in the lower left corner and another near the southern tip of the galaxy. These filler data are very coarse and do not look good up close, but they had to suffice.
Many little annuli were removed, including a giant line of them emanating from Nu Andromedae. I tried to match the backgrounds of each frame as well as I could, but it's not by any means perfect. The NUV channel in particular was devilishly hard to match each disc-shaped frame against one another.
To make the local galactic cirrus more clearly visible, this image relies on complex (or at least, not-quite-simple) color channel assignments. It is similar to an orange-cyan (red-pseudogreen-blue) image, but some of the FUV data is shown a bit greener in the darker areas to bring out the cirrus. Visual aesthetic weighed heavily in the creation of this image, but bluer areas are more intense in FUV and redder areas are more intense in the NUV with the exception of monochrome areas which appear only cyan.
North is up.
Astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have assembled a comprehensive picture of the evolving universe – among the most colorful deep space images ever captured by the telescope.
Researchers say the image, from a study called the Ultraviolet Coverage of the Hubble Ultra Deep Field, provides the missing link in star formation. The Hubble Ultra Deep Field 2014 image is a composite of separate exposures taken in 2002 to 2012 with Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys and Wide Field Camera 3.
Astronomers previously studied the Hubble Ultra Deep Field (HUDF) in visible and near-infrared light in a series of images captured from 2003 to 2009. The HUDF shows a small section of space in the southern-hemisphere constellation Fornax. Now, using ultraviolet light, astronomers have combined the full range of colors available to Hubble, stretching all the way from ultraviolet to near-infrared light. The resulting image – made from 841 orbits of telescope viewing time – contains approximately 10,000 galaxies, extending back in time to within a few hundred million years of the big bang.
Prior to the Ultraviolet Coverage of the Hubble Ultra Deep Field study of the universe, astronomers were in a curious position. Missions such as NASA's Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) observatory, which operated from 2003 to 2013, provided significant knowledge of star formation in nearby galaxies. Using Hubble's near-infrared capability, researchers also studied star birth in the most distant galaxies, which appear to us in their most primitive stages due to the significant amount of time required for the light of distant stars to travel into a visible range. But for the period in between, when most of the stars in the universe were born – a distance extending from about 5 billion to 10 billion light-years – they did not have enough data.
"The lack of information from ultraviolet light made studying galaxies in the HUDF like trying to understand the history of families without knowing about the grade-school children," said principal investigator Harry Teplitz of Caltech in Pasadena, California. "The addition of the ultraviolet fills in this missing range."
Ultraviolet light comes from the hottest, largest, and youngest stars. By observing at these wavelengths, researchers get a direct look at which galaxies are forming stars and where the stars are forming within those galaxies.
Studying the ultraviolet images of galaxies in this intermediate time period enables astronomers to understand how galaxies grew in size by forming small collections of very hot stars. Because Earth's atmosphere filters most ultraviolet light, this work can only be accomplished with a space-based telescope.
"Ultraviolet surveys like this one using the unique capability of Hubble are incredibly important in planning for NASA's James Webb Space Telescope," said team member Rogier Windhorst of Arizona State University in Tempe. "Hubble provides an invaluable ultraviolet-light dataset that researchers will need to combine with infrared data from Webb. This is the first really deep ultraviolet image to show the power of that combination."
For more information, visit:
hubblesite.org/contents/media/images/3886-Image?Tag=Hubbl...
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, H. Teplitz and M. Rafelski (IPAC/Caltech), A. Koekemoer (STScI), R. Windhorst (Arizona State University), and Z. Levay (STScI)
Science Credit: NASA, ESA, H. Teplitz and M. Rafelski (IPAC/Caltech), P. Kurczynski (Rutgers University), N. Bond (Goddard Space Flight Center), E. Soto (Catholic University), N. Grogin and A. Koekemoer (STScI), H. Atek (École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland), T. Brown and D. Coe (STScI), J. Colbert and Y. Dai (IPAC/Caltech), H. Ferguson (STScI), S. Finkelstein (University of Texas, Austin), J. Gardner (Goddard Space Flight Center), E. Gawiser (Rutgers University), M. Giavalisco (University of Massachusetts, Amherst), C. Gronwall (Penn State University), D. Hanish (IPAC/Caltech), K.-S. Lee (Purdue University), Z. Levay (STScI), D. De Mello (Catholic University), S. Ravindranath and R. Ryan (STScI), B. Siana (University of California, Riverside), C. Scarlata (University of Minnesota, Minneapolis), E. Voyer (CNRS, Marseille), and R. Windhorst (Arizona State University)
Believe it or not, this long, luminous streak, speckled with bright blisters and pockets of material, is a spiral galaxy like our Milky Way. But how could that be? It turns out that we see this galaxy, named NGC 3432, orientated directly edge-on to us from our vantage point here on Earth. The galaxy’s spiral arms and bright core are hidden, and we instead see the thin strip of its very outer reaches. Dark bands of cosmic dust, patches of varying brightness, and pink regions of star formation help with making out the true shape of NGC 3432 — but it’s still somewhat of a challenge! Because observatories such as the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have seen spiral galaxies at every kind of orientation, astronomers can tell when we happen to have caught one from the side. The galaxy is located in the constellation of Leo Minor (The Lesser Lion). Other telescopes that have had NGC 3432 in their sights include those of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, the Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX), and the Infrared Astronomical Satellite (IRAS).
For more information, please visit:
www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2019/hubble-traces-a-g...
Text credit: ESA (European Space Agency)
Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, A. Filippenko, R. Jansen
The famous Helix Nebula in ultraviolet from the GALEX mission. There's a version out there that includes infrared data from Spitzer, relegating the GALEX data merely to the blue channel. I think it deserves an image of its own, all by itself. Of course, now I want to go dig around in Spitzer's archive...
Red: NUV (Near ultraviolet)
Green: Pseudo (R+G 50/50)
Blue: FUV (Far ultraviolet)
North is up.
Dans la constellation de la Grande ourse (Ursa Major), à 46 millions d'a.l. de la Terre, la galaxie spirale NGC 2841 présente une structure en anneau interne d'un diamètre de 150 000 a.l.. Il s’agit d’une galaxie spirale floconnante prototypique, dont les bras sont fragmentés et discontinus. Image en ultraviolet (cf. wikipédia, site Hubble).
Pour situer l'astre dans sa constellation :
www.flickr.com/photos/7208148@N02/48752627101/in/album-72...
A dying star is refusing to go quietly into the night, as seen in this combined infrared and ultraviolet view from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and the Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX), which NASA has lent to the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. In death, the star's dusty outer layers are unraveling into space, glowing from the intense ultraviolet radiation being pumped out by the hot stellar core.
This object, called the Helix nebula, lies 650 light-years away in the constellation of Aquarius.
NGC 7479, Caldwell 44, Pegasus, Propeller Galaxy
NGC7479 is a distorted barred spiral galaxy in the constellation of Pegasus, discovered by W. Herschel in 1784. With apparent diameter of 4.4 arcmin, and apparent magnitude of 10.85 (V), visual observation calls for large apertures. However, its basic structures are evident photographically with modest telescopes. From its measurable properties we can derive light travel distance (lookback time) of 110 million light years, redshift recession velocity of 2,379 km/s, actual diameter of 140,000 ly, and absolute magnitude of -21.83 (V), approximately 1.5 times as bright as the Milky Way. NGC7479 has an active galactic nucleus (AGN) which is 8.5 times brighter in the near IR (z filter) than in the visible band, and which emits narrow spectral lines of weakly ionized elements. These characteristics classify it as a Seyfert 2 and a LINER galaxy. It is powered by an actively accreting central supermassive black hole (SMBH) obscured by a large, dense cloud of light-absobing gas and dust. The nucleus is also active at radio frequencies, suggesting the SMBH has polar jets emitting synchrotron radiation. Bright blue floccules in the spiral arms and even within the bar are OB Associations, or vast clusters of recently formed blue giant stars which emit most of their energy in the ultraviolet band. NGC7479 is an isolated field galaxy with no nearby neighbors. Starburst activity, several stellar streams, and gravitational distortion in the W spiral arm are thought to have been caused by a merger with one or more dwarf satellite galaxies between 300 and 100 million years ago.
As the annotated image illustrates, different spectral bands reveal different details within a galaxy. In the ultraviolet band (GALEX), the most prominent features are OB associations, starburst regions, and reflection nebulae. The compact, round UV signal overlapping the N arm of the bar may be the remnant nucleus of a merged dwarf galaxy. The NGC7479 nucleus is not prominent because it is surrounded by a thick layer of gas and dust which absorb and scatter predominantly UV light. However, the brightest feature on the infrared (2MASS) image of the galaxy is precisely the main galactic nucleus with a central SMBH, because longer wavelengths are less obsured. The bulge and the bar are also distinctive due to the presence of ancient cool and red Population II stars. Radio frequency imaging of the galaxy reveals the presence of a bright jet-like feature, centered on the nucleus, and extending through the bar about 20,000 light years in the N and in the S direction. The jet's spiral morphology mildly curves in the direction opposite to that of the stellar and gaseous spiral arms, suggesting that the two structures may be counter-rotating. Jet bending can be caused by precession of the central SMBH accretion disk, by the presence of a binary central SMBH, and/or an off center merger with another galaxy. Based on the rate of expansion and the maximum distance from the nucleus, the jet is felt to be less than 10 million years old.
A large galaxy cluster is visible in the remote background at an estimated light travel distance of 1.5 to 2 billion light years. Only two of these have assigned identifiers. Their measurable and derived properties are listed in the chart on the annotated image.
Image details:
-Remote Takahashi TOA 150 x 1105 mm, Paramount GT GEM,
-OSC 34 x 300 sec, 2x drizzle, 50% linear crop,
-Software: DSS, XnView, StarNet++ v2, StarTools v1.3 and 1.7, Cosmological Calculator v3
Caption: Hickson Compact Group 31 is one of 100 compact galaxy groups catalogued by Canadian astronomer Paul Hickson. Credit: NASA, ESA, S. Gallagher (University of Western Ontario), and J. English (University of Manitoba). Photo No. STScI-PRC10-08a
Jurassic Space: Ancient Galaxies Come Together after Billions of Years
Imagine finding a living dinosaur in your backyard. Astronomers have found the astronomical equivalent of prehistoric life in our intergalactic back yard: a group of small, ancient galaxies that has waited 10 billion years to come together. These "late bloomers" are on their way to building a large elliptical galaxy.
Such encounters between dwarf galaxies are normally seen billions of light-years away and therefore occurred billions of years ago. But these galaxies, members of Hickson Compact Group 31, are relatively nearby, only 166 million light-years away.
New images of these galaxies by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope offer a window into what commonly happened in the universe's formative years when large galaxies were created from smaller building blocks. The Hubble observations have added important clues to the story of this interacting foursome, allowing astronomers to determine when the encounter began and to predict a future merger.
Astronomers know the system has been around for a while because the oldest stars in a few of its ancient globular clusters are about 10 billion years old. The encounter, though, has been going on for about a few hundred million years, the blink of an eye in cosmic history. Everywhere the astronomers looked in this compact group they found batches of infant star clusters and regions brimming with star birth. Hubble reveals that the brightest clusters, hefty groups each holding at least 100,000 stars, are less than 10 million years old.
The entire system is rich in hydrogen gas, the stuff of which stars are made. Astronomers used Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys to resolve the youngest and brightest of those clusters, which allowed them to calculate the clusters' ages, trace the star-formation history, and determine that the galaxies are undergoing the final stages of galaxy assembly.
The composite image of Hickson Compact Group 31 shows the four galaxies mixing it up. The bright, distorted object at middle, left, is actually two colliding dwarf galaxies. The bluish star clusters have formed in the streamers of debris pulled from the galaxies and at the site of their head-on collision. The cigar-shaped object above the galaxy duo is another member of the group. A bridge of star clusters connects the trio. A longer rope of bright star clusters points to the fourth member of the group, at lower right. The bright object in the center is a foreground star. The image was composed from observations made by the Hubble Space Telescope's Advanced Camera for Surveys, NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, and the Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX).
The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and the European Space Agency. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute conducts Hubble science operations. The institute is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc. in Washington, D.C.
Donna Weaver
Space Telescope Science Institute
Link:
www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/hubble/science/jurassicspace-2...
Galaxias interactuantes NGC 4038/4039, popularmente conocidas como Las Antenas, en todas las frecuencias.
Arriba, detalles de la zona central del sistema observado en rayos X (Chandra), visible (NOAO/HST), infrarrojo cercano (NIR: WIRC/Palomar Observatory), infrarrojo medio (MIR, Spitzer) y la emisión de CO a 2.6mm (ALMA) superpuesta a una imagen en óptico.
Abajo, visión total de las galaxias en ultravioleta (UV, GALEX), óptico (SSRO/NOAO) e hidrógeno neutro H I (VLA). Sobre la imagen en óptico se indica con el tamaño de las imágenes superiores.
La fuerte interacción entre las galaxias ha desatado la formación estelar intensa, que se observa en todas las frecuencias. Se han desarrollado dos colas de marea muy ricas en gas hidrógeno neutro.
Crédito de cada imagen en los enlaces (menos la de SSRO/NOAO en óptico, que no encuentro). Crédito de la composición: Ángel López-Sánchez.
Historia en Universo Rayado.
The New General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars (abbreviated as NGC) is a catalogue of deep-sky objects compiled by John Louis Emil Dreyer in 1888 as a new version of John Herschel's General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars. The NGC contains 7,840 objects, known as the NGC objects. It is one of the largest comprehensive catalogues, as it includes all types of deep space objects and is not confined to, for example, galaxies. Dreyer also published two supplements to the NGC in 1895 and 1908, known as the Index Catalogues, describing a further 5,386 astronomical objects.
A dying star is throwing a cosmic tantrum in this combined image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and the Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX), which NASA has lent to the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. In death, the star's dusty outer layers are unraveling into space, glowing from the intense ultraviolet radiation being pumped out by the hot stellar core.
This object, called the Helix nebula, lies 650 light-years away, in the constellation of Aquarius. Also known by the catalog number NGC 7293, it is a typical example of a class of objects called planetary nebulae. Discovered in the 18th century, these cosmic works of art were erroneously named for their resemblance to gas-giant planets.
Planetary nebulae are actually the remains of stars that once looked a lot like our sun. These stars spend most of their lives turning hydrogen into helium in massive runaway nuclear fusion reactions in their cores. In fact, this process of fusion provides all the light and heat that we get from our sun. Our sun will blossom into a planetary nebula when it dies in about five billion years.
When the hydrogen fuel for the fusion reaction runs out, the star turns to helium for a fuel source, burning it into an even heavier mix of carbon, nitrogen and oxygen. Eventually, the helium will also be exhausted, and the star dies, puffing off its outer gaseous layers and leaving behind the tiny, hot, dense core, called a white dwarf. The white dwarf is about the size of Earth, but has a mass very close to that of the original star; in fact, a teaspoon of a white dwarf would weigh as much as a few elephants!
The glow from planetary nebulae is particularly intriguing as it appears surprisingly similar across a broad swath of the spectrum, from ultraviolet to infrared. The Helix remains recognizable at any of these wavelengths, but the combination shown here highlights some subtle differences.
The intense ultraviolet radiation from the white dwarf heats up the expelled layers of gas, which shine brightly in the infrared. GALEX has picked out the ultraviolet light pouring out of this system, shown throughout the nebula in blue, while Spitzer has snagged the detailed infrared signature of the dust and gas in yellow A portion of the extended field beyond the nebula, which was not observed by Spitzer, is from NASA's all-sky Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE). The white dwarf star itself is a tiny white pinprick right at the center of the nebula.
The brighter purple circle in the very center is the combined ultraviolet and infrared glow of a dusty disk circling the white dwarf (the disk itself is too small to be resolved). This dust was most likely kicked up by comets that survived the death of their star.
Before the star died, its comets, and possibly planets, would have orbited the star in an orderly fashion. When the star ran out of hydrogen to burn, and blew off its outer layers, the icy bodies and outer planets would have been tossed about and into each other, kicking up an ongoing cosmic dust storm. Any inner planets in the system would have burned up or been swallowed as their dying star expanded.
Infrared data from Spitzer for the central nebula is rendered in green (wavelengths of 3.6 to 4.5 microns) and red (8 to 24 microns), with WISE data covering the outer areas in green (3.4 to 4.5 microns) and red (12 to 22 microns). Ultraviolet data from GALEX appears as blue (0.15 to 2.3 microns).
This Actros truck from Romania was driving down the M2. The truck was operated by Galex Transport, based in the town of Dumbrăveni, located in the centre of Transylvania in the north of Sibiu County in central Romania. The truck was pulling a trailer, operated by Spanish based Logesta Logistics.
M2, Kent, United Kingdom
This image of the Pinwheel Galaxy, or M101, combines data in the infrared, visible, ultraviolet and x-rays from four of NASA’s space telescopes. This multi-spectral view shows that both young and old stars are evenly distributed along M101’s tightly-wound spiral arms. Such composite images allow astronomers to see how features in one part of the spectrum match up with those seen in other parts. It is like seeing with a regular camera, an ultraviolet camera, night-vision goggles and X-Ray vision, all at once! The Pinwheel Galaxy is in the constellation of Ursa Major (also known as the Big Dipper). It is about 70% larger than our own Milky Way Galaxy, with a diameter of about 170,000 light years, and sits at a distance of 21 million light years from Earth. This means that the light we’re seeing in this image left the Pinwheel Galaxy about 21 million years ago - many millions of years before humans ever walked the Earth. The red colors in the image show infrared light, as seen by the Spitzer Space Telescope. These areas show the heat emitted by dusty lanes in the galaxy, where stars are forming. The yellow component is visible light, observed by the Hubble Space Telescope. Most of this light comes from stars, and they trace the same spiral structure as the dust lanes seen in the infrared. The blue areas are ultraviolet light, given out by hot, young stars that formed about 1 million years ago. The Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) captured this component of the image. Finally, the hottest areas are shown in purple, where the Chandra X-ray observatory observed the X-ray emission from exploded stars, million-degree gas, and material colliding around black holes.
Out of this world public domain images from NASA. All original images and many more can be found from the NASA Image Library
Higher resolutions with no attribution required can be downloaded: www.rawpixel.com/board/418580/nasa