View allAll Photos Tagged SPIRALGALAXY
Edited NOIRLab image of NGC 1510 and NGC 1512. Color/processing variant.
Image source: noirlab.edu/public/news/noirlab2210/
Original caption: The interacting galaxy pair NGC 1512 and NGC 1510 take center stage in this image from the Dark Energy Camera, a state-of-the art wide-field imager on the Víctor M. Blanco 4-meter Telescope at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory, a Program of NSF’s NOIRLab. NGC 1512 has been in the process of merging with its smaller galactic neighbor for 400 million years, and this drawn-out interaction has ignited waves of star formation and warped both galaxies.
The disturbed spiral galaxy Messier 66 (M66) is located about 35 million light-years away in the direction of the constellation Leo, the Lion. Together with Messier 65 and NGC 3628, M66 is one-third of the Leo Triplet, a trio of interacting spiral galaxies, part of the larger Messier 66 group. Messier 66 is the largest of the three galaxies. Like the Milky Way, it is approximately 100,000 light-years across. Unlike our galaxy, it displays asymmetric spiral arms and an apparently displaced core. Its peculiar anatomy is most likely caused by the gravitational pull of the other two members of the trio.
This image was taken by Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys and shows only about a third of the galaxy. Interestingly, M66 has hosted three supernovas within the last 29 years. The latest one, in 2009, was bright enough to be seen in amateur-sized telescopes.
For more information, visit: www.spacetelescope.org/news/heic1006/
Credit: NASA, ESA and the Hubble Heritage (STScI/AURA)-ESA/Hubble Collaboration;
Acknowledgment: Davide De Martin and Robert Gendler
This image depicts the spiral galaxy NGC 3810, which in 2023 was included in a Hubble programme to improve the accuracy of distance measurements made using Type Ia supernovae. This was only possible because a white dwarf in NGC 3810 had just gone supernova, and Hubble captured this image before the supernova faded from view.
Supernovae are named for their year of discovery, followed by an incrementing tag of letters — a, b, and so on. Nowadays, with automated surveys, thousands of supernovae are discovered every year, and so this one received the name SN 2022zut, as the eighteen thousand, one hundred and forty-second found in 2022!
Learn more about this galaxy and Type Ia supernova at the main image, here.
[Image Description: A spiral galaxy, with a shining core in the centre and winding spiral arms. A bright point in the galaxy, just below the core, has been marked with a white circle and the text “SN2022zut”.]
Credits: ESA/Hubble & NASA, D. Sand, R. J. Foley; CC BY 4.0
The Spiral Galaxy NGC 891 in the constellation Andromeda, it is approximately 30 million light years distant. This was an "end of the night" image, so it only consists of 9 minutes total exposure (9 x one-minute at ISO 3200) using my Canon 6D and 400mm lens mounted on an iOptron ZEQ mount.
I recently processed an image of this galaxy trio using data captured by my husband during April, and I became very fond of it. You can view the photo here: flic.kr/p/2kZsHQc
I just knew I'd have to sketch it at some point during my UKMON Fireball Challenge to create an astronomy sketch or astronomy inspired piece of art every day for 2 months. The weather is awful again today, so I decided to draw this using the photo as a reference. I sketched it with a 5B pencil on white paper, using a smudging stick for blending. Once finished I scanned the sketch and digitally inverted it.
The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope is no stranger to spiral galaxies. The telescope has brought us some of the most beautiful images ever taken of our spiral neighbors — and the galaxy known as NGC 4689 is no exception.
However, seen almost face on, NGC 4689 appears less like a majestic spiral and more like a smudged fingerprint on the sky. No matter how good the image quality, there is little contrast between the spiraling arms of stars, gas and dust, and the less dense areas in between. This is because NGC 4689 is something known as an “anemic galaxy,” a galaxy that contains only quite small quantities of the raw materials needed to produce stars. This means that star formation is quelled in NGC 4689, and the pinwheeling, bustling arms are less bright than those belonging to other spiral galaxies.
Despite this subtlety when compared to its brash, spotlight-stealing relatives, NGC 4689 retains an otherworldly charm, its delicately glowing material standing out subtly from the surrounding darkness of space.
For more information: www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2020/hubble-fingerprin...
Text credit: ESA (European Space Agency)
Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA
Quatrième version de la galaxie du tourbillon, dans la constellation des Chiens de Chasse à 1600 mm (équivalent à 2400 mm en 24x36: 42 photos, 10 Darks, 19 Offsets ; 14 Flats. Assemblage dans IRIS (avec binning x2) et cosmétique dans Photoshop CS4. Nikon D5300 modifié astro par Eos for Astro, Skywatcher Quattro 400 (F=800mm, D=200mm) Suivi à l'aide d'une Skywatcher EQ6-R Pro. Nikon D5300 avec filtre clip in LPS-V4-N5
Paramètres: 42x 120s F/8 ISO 4000, 1600mm.
Série prise le 31.05.2019 depuis mon balcon (la cible se trouvait au dessus de la ville, ce qui générait donc une importante pollution lumineuse).
This peculiar galaxy, beautifully streaked with tendrils of reddish dust, is captured here in wonderful detail by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.
The galaxy is known as NGC 1022, and is officially classified as a barred spiral galaxy. You can just about make out the bar of stars in the center of the galaxy in this image, with swirling arms emerging from its ends. This bar is much less prominent than in some of the galaxy’s barred cousins and gives the galaxy a rather squat appearance; but the lanes of dust that swirl throughout its disk ensure it is no less beautiful.
Hubble observed this image as part of a study into one of the universe’s most notorious residents: black holes. These are fundamental components of galaxies and are thought to lurk at the hearts of many — if not all — spirals. In fact, they may have quite a large influence over their cosmic homes. Studies suggest that the mass of the black hole sitting at a galaxy’s center is linked with the larger-scale properties of the galaxy itself. However, in order to learn more, we need observational data of a wider and more diverse range of galaxies — something Hubble’s study aims to provide.
For more information: www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2020/hubble-sees-dusty...
Text credit: ESA (European Space Agency)
Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, A. Seth
25 sec, f/2.8, ISO 4000 | Nikon D4 + 14-24mm f/2.8G | Badlands National Park, South Dakota, 18 July 2013
© 2013 José Francisco Salgado, PhD
Do not use without permission.
This Hubble image from the Wide Field Camera 3 shows NGC 1566, a beautiful galaxy located approximately 40 million light-years away in the constellation of Dorado (the Dolphinfish). NGC 1566 is an intermediate spiral galaxy, meaning that while it does not have a well-defined bar-shaped region of stars at its center — like a fully barred spiral — it is not quite a pure, unbarred spiral either.
The small but extremely bright nucleus of NGC 1566 is a telltale sign of its membership of the Seyfert class of galaxies. The centers of such galaxies are very active and luminous, emitting strong bursts of radiation, and indicating the presence of a supermassive black hole many millions of times the mass of the Sun. NGC 1566 is not just any Seyfert galaxy; it is the second brightest Seyfert galaxy known. It is also the brightest and most dominant member of the Dorado Group, a loose concentration of galaxies that together comprise one of the richest galaxy groups of the southern hemisphere.
This image highlights the beauty and awe-inspiring nature of this unique galaxy group, with NGC 1566’s bright nucleus framed by starbursting and symmetrical spiral arms.
For more information, visit: www.spacetelescope.org/images/potw1422a/
Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA;
Acknowledgment: Flickr user Det58
Astronomers have used Hubble’s Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2) and Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) to study a young globular star cluster in Caldwell 12 (NGC 6946). This image shows the star cluster in visible light.
Credit: NASA, ESA, and S. Larsen (Radboud Universiteit Nimegen); Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America)
For Hubble's Caldwell catalog website and information on how to find these objects in the night sky, visit:
The spiral galaxy NGC253 in the constellation Sculptor. Sometimes called the Silver Coin Galaxy. Discovered in 1783 by Caroline Herschel. It's at the center of the Sculptor group of galaxies, one of the nearest to our own galaxy.
Roughly 11.4 million light years away, this image was taken with a 900mm Maksutov-Newtonian telescope and an ST10xe camera with RGB filters..
Video release date March 8, 2010
Panning over Messier 66, the largest galaxy within the Leo Triplet. M66 is located at a distance of about 35 million light-years in the constellation of Leo.
Credit: ESA/Hubble
To download this video go to: www.spacetelescope.org/videos/html/heic1006c.html
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center is home to the nation's largest organization of combined scientists, engineers and technologists that build spacecraft, instruments and new technology to study the Earth, the sun, our solar system, and the universe.
Everglades National Park is enchanting by day, but it truly comes alive at night. The symphony of crickets and frogs fills the air, fireflies perform their dance, and the park transforms into a celestial wonderland beneath the night sky. It's humbling to consider that I'm gazing at the same timeless stars that once graced the skies above the dinosaurs. Places like this remind us to cherish the undisturbed beauty of the night sky. 🌌
Mosaic of two panels to show both of these galaxies in Leo. Each panel is a stack of 6 min exposures. M96 (NGC 3368) is on the left, and M95 (NGC 3351) is on the right. There are about 30 other smaller galaxies that also appear in this image. I have the galaxies at the bottom in case I later want to extend the mosaic northward to include more bright galaxies in Leo.
Images acquired with a Celestron Edge HD 9.25" at f/2.3 with HyperStar and an Atik 314L+ color CCD. Preprocessing was done in Nebulosity, and stacking, mosaic composition, and processing were done in PixInsight. Final touches in PS CS 5.1.
The image center (J2000) is at
RA 10h 45m 20s
DEC +11° 57' 58"
The image spans 1° 9' by 55'.
Amid a backdrop of far-off galaxies, the majestic dusty spiral NGC 3370 looms in the foreground of this picture taken by Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys. The image shows intricate spiral arm structure spotted with hot areas of new star formation.
This galaxy was home to one of the best-observed supernovas since the age of digital detectors. It was a type Ia supernova, used to chart the growth rate of the expanding universe. The observations contributed to the discovery that the expansion of the universe is accelerating, leading to the possibility that an unknown "dark energy" is propelling the expansion.
For more information, please visit: hubblesite.org/image/1398/news_release/2003-24
Credit: NASA, the Hubble Heritage Team, and A. Riess (STScI)
NGC2903 is a local barred spiral galaxy about 20million light years away, with some bright tight spiral arms and two much fainter arms stretched out from the galaxy. View at original size to see the outer arms.
61 exposures ranging from 30 seconds to 2 minutes, 53 minutes total exposure time. Flat frames also used. Shot on a Canon Ti1 at prime focus on a Meade 10" SN-10-AT.
Must get light pollution filter, and fix a few problems.
I would have cropped it down more to hide the black band along the lower right (dark part of camera chip at bottom of some sub-exposures, not eliminated by the flat frames) ... but, in that corner there is a cluster of tiny galaxies. I couldn't find much info on them, but by comparing their size to the main target I would guess they are 500+ million light years away.
There are several other tiny background galaxies in this shot, fuzzy specs (fuzzier than the splotchy stars) How many can you count?
A spectacular dark band of light-absorbing dust in front of this galaxy's bright nucleus gives rise to its nicknames of the "Black Eye" or "Evil Eye" galaxy.
Fine details of the dark band are revealed in this image of the central portion of Messier 64 (M64) obtained with the Hubble Space Telescope.
M64 has bizarre internal motions as well as an unusual appearance. As in the majority of galaxies, all of the stars in M64 are rotating in the same direction, clockwise as seen in the Hubble image. However, detailed studies in the 1990s led to the discovery that the interstellar gas in the outer regions of M64 rotates in the opposite direction from the gas and stars in the inner regions.
Active formation of new stars is occurring in the shear region where the oppositely rotating gases collide, are compressed, and contract. Particularly noticeable in the image are hot, blue young stars that have just formed, along with pink clouds of glowing hydrogen gas that fluoresce when exposed to ultraviolet light from newly formed stars.
Astronomers believe that the oppositely rotating gas arose when M64 absorbed a satellite galaxy that collided with it, perhaps more than one billion years ago. This small galaxy has now been almost completely destroyed, but signs of the collision persist in the backward motion of gas at the outer edge of M64.
For more information, visit: hubblesite.org/image/1447/news_release/2004-04
Credit: NASA and the Hubble Heritage Team (AURA/STScI);
Acknowledgment: S. Smartt (Institute of Astronomy) and D. Richstone (U. Michigan)
Edited Hubble Space Telescope image of the galaxy NGC 1589 where it appears as if the central black hole just ate a star. Color/processing variant.
Original caption: The subject of this Picture of the Week, a spiral galaxy named NGC 1589, was once the scene of a violent bout of cosmic hunger pangs; as astronomers looked on, a poor, hapless star was torn apart and devoured by the ravenous supermassive black hole at the centre of the galaxy. The astronomers are now using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope to test this interpretation. Hubble has observed such events before so the scientists are confident that Hubble will be able to provide smoking gun evidence in the form of stellar debris that was ejected during the disruption event.
The milky way as seen from the African Bushveld in the Waterberg (Limpopo Province, South Africa).
Interesting Fact:
There are more atoms in a human eye than all the stars in the known universe, which is estimated at 1 Billion Trillion stars
(1 000 000 000 000 000 000 000).
Martin
-
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The Triangulum Galaxy (M33). Returning to an old favourite, we thought we'd add the captured data to data taken from a similar session two years ago and see if nearly six and a half hours of exposures improved the image. It does but not as much as I'd hoped although processing the image was easier. I think the resulting image looks a bit more natural than the attempt in 2018.
[From Wikipedia]
The Triangulum Galaxy is a spiral galaxy 2.73 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Triangulum. It is catalogued as Messier 33 or NGC 598. The Triangulum Galaxy is the third-largest member of the Local Group of galaxies, behind the Milky Way and the Andromeda Galaxy. It is one of the most distant permanent objects that can be viewed with the naked eye. The galaxy is the smallest spiral galaxy in the Local Group and is believed to be a satellite of the Andromeda Galaxy or on its rebound into the latter due to their interactions, velocities, and proximity to one another in the night sky.
10/10/2018
042 x 300 second exposures at Unity Gain (139) cooled to -20°C
050 x dark frames
030 x flat frames
100 x bias frames
17/09/2020
035 x 300 second exposures at Unity Gain (139) cooled to -20°C
054 x dark frames
040 x flat frames
100 x bias frames
Total
077 x 300 second exposures at Unity Gain (139) cooled to -20°C
104 x dark frames
070 x flat frames
100 x bias frames (subtracted from flat frames)
Binning 1x1
Total integration time = 6 hours and 25 minutes
Captured with APT
Guided with PHD2
Processed in Nebulosity and Photoshop
Equipment:
Telescope: Sky-Watcher Explorer-150PDS
Mount: Skywatcher EQ5
Guide Scope: Orion 50mm Mini
Guiding Camera: ZWO ASI120MC
Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI1600MC Pro
Baader Mark-III MPCC Coma Corrector
Light pollution filter
Barred Spiral Galaxy NGC 1672. HST ACS/WFC. NASA, ESA, & The Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)-ESA/Hubble Collaboration
Description: This Chandra image of M101 is one of the longest exposures ever obtained of a spiral galaxy in X-rays. The point-like sources include binary star systems containing black holes and neutron stars, and the remains of supernova explosions. Other sources of X-rays include hot gas in the arms of the galaxy and clusters of massive stars. These X-ray observations of M101 will be used to establish a valuable X-ray profile of a galaxy similar to the Milky Way. This will help astronomers better understand the evolutionary paths that produce black holes, and provide a baseline for interpreting the observations of distant galaxies.
Creator/Photographer: Chandra X-ray Observatory
The 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. 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: 2008
Persistent URL: chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2008/m101/
Repository: Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
Gift line: NASA/CXC/JHU/K.Kuntz et al.
Accession number: m101
Found in the constellation Leo, M95 is a beautiful barred spiral galaxy. It was discovered in 1781 by Pierre Méchain, a colleague of Charles Messier.
This Hubble observation reveals a section of M95 featuring its central bar of stars in the upper left and one of its spiral arms extending to the lower right. The observations were taken in near-infrared, visible, and ultraviolet wavelengths of light with Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys and Wide Field Camera 3. Hubble took these observations of M95 to better understand star formation in nearby galaxies.
M95 is located approximately 33 million light-years away and has a magnitude of 9.7. It has around 40 billion stars. Its spiral arms host a flurry of star birth activity and sparkle with the light of countless young, blue stars. The arms themselves are very tightly wound around the galaxy's core and are nearly circular.
M95 can be seen as a hazy smudge on a clear, dark night using a good pair of binoculars, but large telescopes will reveal more detail. It appears close to M96, M105, and a number of fainter galaxies that all belong to the Leo I (or M96) group. The best time of the year to view M95 is in April.
Credits: NASA, ESA, STScI, and D. Calzetti (University of Massachusetts, Amherst) and R. Chandar (University of Toledo)
The Pinwheel Galaxy (also known as Messier 101, M101 or NGC 5457). Another clear night with no moon - perfect conditions for imaging galaxies - proved irresitible and since it's been a couple of years since we last pointed a telescope at M101, it seemed like a good target to go for. There are still a few teething problems to sort out with the updated software and we had some guiding issues which meant that despite an early start we lost valuable imaging time. Still, we did manage to get just under three hours of reasonably good data which was enough to make an image with although I would have prefered more exposure time.
[Information from Wikipedia]
Messier 101 is a face-on spiral galaxy distanced approximately 21 million light-years away from Earth in the constellation Ursa Major. It is a large galaxy, with a diameter of 170,000 light-years. By comparison, the Milky Way has a diameter of 100,000 light years. It has around a trillion stars, twice the number in the Milky Way. It has a disk mass on the order of 100 billion solar masses, along with a small central bulge of about 3 billion solar masses.
035 x 300 second exposures at Unity Gain (139) cooled to -20°C
050 x dark frames
040 x flat frames
100 x bias frames (subtracted from flat frames)
Binning 1x1
Total integration time = 2 hours and 55 minutes
Captured with APT
Guided with PHD2
Processed in Nebulosity and Photoshop
Equipment:
Telescope: Sky-Watcher Explorer-150PDS
Mount: Skywatcher EQ5
Guide Scope: Orion 50mm Mini
Guiding Camera: ZWO ASI120MC
Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI1600MC Pro
Baader Mark-III MPCC Coma Corrector
Light pollution filter
The subject of this image taken by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, a spiral galaxy named NGC 1589, was once the scene of a violent bout of cosmic hunger pangs. As astronomers looked on, a poor, hapless star was seemingly torn apart and devoured by the ravenous supermassive black hole at the center of the galaxy.
The astronomers are now using Hubble to test this interpretation. The telescope has observed such events before, so the scientists are confident that Hubble will be able to provide smoking-gun evidence in the form of stellar debris that was ejected during the disruption event.
For more information: www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2020/hubble-investigat...
Text credit: ESA (European Space Agency)
Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA
NGC 5033, a spiral galaxy located in the constellation Canes Venatici. This image reveals the intricate structure and dynamic features within the galaxy, showcasing a beautiful palette derived from LRGB data. The galaxy's bright nucleus, likely powered by a supermassive black hole, and its faint spiral arms are prominently featured. The arms, dotted with star-forming regions and massive blue star clusters, span over 100,000 light-years, making NGC 5033 similar in size to our own Milky Way.
Technical Details:
Telescope: 🔭 ASA RC600 24inch F4.5
Mount: 🌌 ASA DDM200
Camera: 📷 Moravian C3 Pro
Filters: 🎨 FLI LRGB
Exposure:
Luminance: 300s x 9
Red: 60s x 3
Green: 60s x 3
Blue: 60s x 3
Total Integration:
Luminance: 45 minutes
RGB: 9 minutes
Processing:
The image was processed using MaximDL, PixInsight, and Photoshop to enhance the galaxy's vivid details and colors, bringing out the majestic spiral arms and the core's luminosity.
Location and Date:
Namibia, June 2022
Enjoy this celestial masterpiece, which highlights both the beauty and complexity of NGC 5033, a well-studied example of a Seyfert galaxy with a rich and varied structure.
Thanks for watching,
Haim
This smattering of celestial sequins is a spiral galaxy named NGC 4455, located in the northern constellation of Coma Berenices (Berenice’s Hair). This might sound like an odd name for a constellation — and in fact it is somewhat unusual. It’s the only modern constellation to be named in honor of a real person from history: Queen Berenice II of Egypt.
The story of Queen Berenice II is an interesting one. A ruling queen of the ancient Greek city of Cyrene in modern-day Libya, and later a queen of Ptolemaic Egypt through her marriage to her cousin Ptolemy III Euergetes, Berenice became known for sacrificing locks of her hair as an offering to ensure her husband’s safe return from battle. Her husband did indeed return safely, and her hair, which she had left in a Zephyrium temple, had disappeared — it had apparently been stolen and placed among the stars.
Should it be located in NGC 4455, it traveled a long way. The galaxy is about 45 million light-years away. This image was taken by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope’s Advanced Camera for Surveys.
For more information: www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2020/hubble-sights-gal...
Text credit: ESA (European Space Agency)
Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, I. Karachentsev et al.
This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shows IC 2051, a galaxy in the southern constellation of Mensa (the Table Mountain) lying about 85 million light-years away. It is a spiral galaxy, as evidenced by its characteristic whirling, pinwheeling arms, and it has a bar of stars slicing through its center.
This galaxy was observed for a Hubble study on galactic bulges, the bright round central regions of spiral galaxies. Spiral galaxies like IC 2051 are shaped a bit like flying saucers when seen from the side; they comprise a thin, flat disk, with a bulky bulge of stars in the center that extends above and below the disk. These bulges are thought to play a key role in how galaxies evolve, and to influence the growth of the supermassive black holes lurking at the centers of most spirals. While more observations are needed in this area, studies suggest that some, or even most, galactic bulges may be complex composite structures rather than simple ones, with a mix of spherical, disk-like, or boxy components, potentially leading to a wide array of bulge morphologies in the universe.
This image comprises data from Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 at visible and infrared wavelengths.
For more information: www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2019/hubble-s-close-up...
Text credit: ESA (European Space Agency)
Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, P. Erwin et al.
A rare clear night without a full moon enabled us to revisit another old target after 3 years...
The Leo Triplet (also known as the M66 Group) is a small group of galaxies about 35 million light-years away in the constellation Leo. This galaxy group consists of the spiral galaxies M65 (bottom right), M66 (bottom left), and NGC 3628 (top).
Messier 65 (also known as NGC 3623) is an intermediate spiral galaxy about 35 million light-years away in the constellation Leo, within its highly equatorial southern half.
Messier 66 or M66, also known as NGC 3627, is an intermediate spiral galaxy in the southern, equatorial half of Leo. It lies 31 million light-years away and is about 95 thousand light-years across with striking dust lanes and bright star clusters along sweeping spiral arms.
NGC 3628, also known as the Hamburger Galaxy or Sarah's Galaxy, is an unbarred spiral galaxy about 35 million light-years away in the constellation Leo. It has an approximately 300,000 light-years long tidal tail. Its most conspicuous feature is the broad and obscuring band of dust located along the outer edge of its spiral arms, effectively transecting the galaxy to the view from Earth.
27-28/01/2022
032 x 300-second exposures at Unity Gain (139) cooled to -10°C
033 x dark frames
040 x flat frames
100 x bias frames
Binning 1x1
Total integration time = 2 hours and 40 minutes
Captured with APT
Guided with PHD2
Processed in Nebulosity and Photoshop
Equipment:
Telescope: Sky-Watcher Explorer-150PDS
Mount: Skywatcher EQ5
Guide Scope: Orion 50mm Mini
Guiding Camera: SVBONY SV105 with ZWO USBST4 guider adapter
Imaging Camera: ZWO ASI1600MC Pro with anti-dew heater
Baader Mark-III MPCC Coma Corrector
Optolong L-Pro filter
To the surprise of astronomers, galaxy NGC 4622 appears to be rotating in the opposite direction from what they expected. Using a dust silhouette method, which indicates what side of the galaxy is closer to Earth, data from Hubble helped astronomers determine that the galaxy is rotating in a clockwise direction. This result was later confirmed through an independent means of investigation. Based on galaxy simulations, astronomers had expected that the galaxy was turning counterclockwise.
Most spiral galaxies have arms of gas and stars that trail behind as they turn. But this galaxy has two "leading" outer arms, meaning that they are "winding outward." To add to the conundrum, NGC 4622 also has a "trailing" inner arm that is wrapped around the galaxy in the opposite direction it is rotating.
Astronomers suspect that NGC 4622's behavior results from interactions with another galaxy. Its two outer arms are lopsided, meaning that something disturbed them. The galaxy's core also provides evidence for a merger between NGC 4622 and a smaller galaxy.
NGC 4622 lies approximately 111 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Centaurus.
For more information, visit: hubblesite.org/image/1137/news_release/2002-03
Credit: NASA and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA);
Acknowledgment: Dr. Ron Buta (U. Alabama), Dr. Gene Byrd (U. Alabama), and Tarsh Freeman (Bevill State Community College)
Astronomers have used Hubble’s Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2) and Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) to study a young globular star cluster in Caldwell 12 (NGC 6946). This image shows the star cluster in infrared light.
Credit: NASA, ESA, K. Long (Eureka Scientific), and A. Leroy (Ohio State University)
For Hubble's Caldwell catalog website and information on how to find these objects in the night sky, visit:
What resemble grains of sand in this Hubble image are actually individual stars embedded deep in the heart of the nearby spiral galaxy Caldwell 70. Hubble's exquisite resolution allows us to see the galaxy’s stars as distinct points of light, despite the fact that the galaxy is about 6 million light-years away.
Caldwell 70 has sweeping blue spiral arms with vigorous star formation throughout. The inner region of the galaxy, an area spanning about 7,500 light-years, is pictured here. At the center is the galaxy’s bright, densely packed core surrounded by tendrils of dark dust meandering among the stars in the galactic plane.
While Caldwell 70 is one of the Milky Way’s closest galactic neighbors, it’s so far away that only the brightest stars can be picked out in ground-based telescopes. With a magnitude of 8.1, the galaxy can be seen through a small telescope, but don’t expect to see an image like this one! With a resolution some 10 to 20 times better than ground-based telescopes, Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys resolves many more stars in this galaxy than can be detected from the ground. Hubble's unique ability to distinguish so many stars in Caldwell 70 helped astronomers test a new technique for measuring distances to other galaxies using blue supergiant stars and compare that technique to more traditional measurement methods.
Also known as NGC 300, Caldwell 70 is a member of a nearby collection of galaxies called the Sculptor group, named for the southern constellation where the galaxies can be found. Discovered from Australia by Scottish astronomer James Dunlop in 1826, Caldwell 70 appears low in the autumn sky in the Northern Hemisphere but is best viewed in the springtime from the Southern Hemisphere. Caldwell 70 spans nearly the same amount of sky as the full moon.
For more information about Hubble’s observations of Caldwell 70, see:
hubblesite.org/contents/news-releases/2004/news-2004-13.h...
Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (AURA/STScI)
For Hubble's Caldwell catalog website and information on how to find these objects in the night sky, visit:
🌌 "The Grand Spiral of M100" 🌌
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www.instagram.com/ale_motta_astrofotografia
Spinning serenely in the heart of the Virgo Cluster, Messier 100 is one of the most majestic grand design spiral galaxies known to us.
Also cataloged as NGC 4321, this face-on beauty showcases tightly wound spiral arms, glowing with star-forming regions and interlaced with dark dust lanes. At approximately 55 million light-years from Earth, M100 spans over 100,000 light-years — rivaling the Milky Way in size and elegance. Its well-defined structure and active star-forming activity make it a key object of study in understanding galactic evolution.
Galaxy Type: Grand Design Spiral (SAB(s)bc)
Constellation: Coma Berenices
Distance: ~55 million light-years
Apparent Magnitude: 10.1
Coordinates: RA 12h22m54s, Dec +15°49′20″
Lights: 125x300" (LRGB)
Telescope: Planewave CDK24
Camera: QHY 600M
Filters: LRGB Astrodon
Processed: Pixinsight
Date: 31/03/2025
#M100 #Messier100 #SpiralGalaxy #DeepSkyObjects #Astrophotography #GalacticBeauty #VirgoCluster #NGC4321 #CosmosWonder #AstronomyArt #SpaceLovers #AstroPhotographyDaily #UniverseRevealed
This image of the central region of spiral galaxy NGC 3521 is not out of focus. Instead, the galaxy itself has a soft, woolly appearance.
NGC 3521 is a member of a class of galaxies known as flocculent spirals. Like other flocculent galaxies, NGC 3521 lacks the clearly defined, arcing structure to its spiral arms, and patches of stars and dust show up here and there throughout their disks. Sometimes the clusters of stars are arranged in a generally spiraling form, as with NGC 3521, but illuminated, star-filled regions can also appear as short or discontinuous spiral arms. About 30 percent of galaxies share NGC 3521's patchiness.
NGC 3521 is located about 26 million light-years away and is found in the constellation Leo.
For more information, visit: www.spacetelescope.org/images/potw1538a/
Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA and S. Smartt (Queen's University Belfast);
Acknowledgment: Robert Gendler
This hazy, steely blue spiral galaxy mottled with pink, flower-like gaseous regions and granular filaments of dark dust is Caldwell 7 (also called NGC 2403). The galaxy’s pinkish, glowing clouds are the energetic birthplaces of stars known as H II regions. In these vast, hot areas of ionized hydrogen, the charged gas can form thousands of stars over a couple million years, with each hot newborn star emitting ultraviolet light, further ionizing the surrounding hydrogen.
Roughly 80,000 light-years across, this galaxy became well known amongst supernova hunters in 2004 after Caldwell 7 produced the brightest supernova seen in over a decade (and one of the brightest ever recorded). Supernova 2004dj had a magnitude of 11.2 at peak brightness, and appears as the bright star-like object in the upper right corner of this Hubble image.
Two bright stars hovering near the top of this view could be confused with supernovae, but they are actually local Milky Way stars, far closer to us than Caldwell 7 is. The galaxy is over 12 million light-years away from Earth and can best be seen in the Northern Hemisphere during the winter months. Southern Hemisphere observers will need to be near the equator to see it and should look for it in the summer. The galaxy can be found with binoculars or a telescope, appearing as an elongated fuzzy patch within the bounds of the constellation Camelopardalis, and is relatively bright at magnitude 8.9.
Though Caldwell 7 is comparable to many galaxies in Charles Messier’s famed catalog of celestial objects, the French astronomer missed it when compiling his list. The galaxy was instead discovered by German-British astronomer William Herschel in 1788.
This image, which captures the core and some of the spiral arms of Caldwell 7, was taken with Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys on August 17, 2004, two weeks after a Japanese amateur astronomer discovered Supernova 2004dj. In addition to this visible-light image, astronomers have used ultraviolet images and spectroscopic observations from Hubble to further investigate how certain types of stars explode and what kinds of chemical elements they eject into space.
Credit: NASA, ESA, A.V. Filippenko (University of California, Berkeley), P. Challis (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics), et al.
For more information about Hubble’s observations of Caldwell 7, see:
hubblesite.org/contents/news-releases/2004/news-2004-23.html
For Hubble's Caldwell catalog website and information on how to find these objects in the night sky, visit:
This image from Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 showcases the remarkable galaxy UGC 12591. Classified as an S0/Sa galaxy, UGC 12591 fits somewhere between a lenticular and a spiral in the morphological classifications of galaxies.
The galaxy and its halo together contain several hundred billion times the mass of the Sun, which is four times the mass of the Milky Way — a very massive object. Clocked at speeds of up to 1.1 million miles per hour, it also rotates extremely quickly.
Observations with Hubble are helping astronomers to understand the mass of UGC 1259, and to determine whether the galaxy grew slowly by itself over time, or whether it might have grown unusually massive by colliding and merging with another large galaxy at some point in its past.
For more information, visit: www.spacetelescope.org/images/potw1709a/
Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA
This infrared view of the spiral galaxy Caldwell 40 (NGC 3626) is a single image captured by Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3.
Credit: NASA, ESA, and P. Erwin (Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics); Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America)
For Hubble's Caldwell catalog website and information on how to find these objects in the night sky, visit:
Edited Hubble Space Telescope image of the pretty, barred spiral galaxy NGC 2336. Color/processing variant.
Original caption: NGC 2336 is the quintessential galaxy â big, beautiful and blue â and it is captured here by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. The barred spiral galaxy stretches an immense 200 000 light-years across and is located approximately 100 million light years away in the northern constellation of Camelopardalis (The Giraffe). Its spiral arms are glittered with young stars, visible in their bright blue light. In contrast, the redder central part of the galaxy is dominated by older stars. NGC 2336 was discovered in 1876 by German astronomer Wilhelm Tempel, using a 28-centimetre telescope. This Hubble image is so much better than the view Tempel would have had â Hubbleâs main mirror is 2.4 metres across, nearly ten times the size of the telescope Tempel used. In 1987, NGC 2336 experienced a Type-Ia supernova, the only observed supernova in the galaxy since its discovery 111 years earlier.
This photogenic celestial object, the magnificent spiral galaxy M100, is seen here as observed with Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3, which was installed during the last space shuttle servicing mission to Hubble in May 2009. The M100 photo was taken a few months later and was exhibited to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Hubble's 25th anniversary of the first servicing mission, which fixed Hubble's originally blurred vision. M100 was also captured with Hubble's flawed vision in 1993. For a comparison, see here: hubblesite.org/contents/media/images/2018/48/4272-Image.h...
M100 is designated a grand-design spiral galaxy because of its two prominent lanes of young, blue stars. This is caused by ripples of matter in the stellar disk that propagate through the galaxy and create high-density regions of gas. These denser areas precipitate new star formation. In addition, clearly visible are two tightly wound, inner spiral arms wrapping around the core where there is a small bar pattern of stars. The yellowish color of the inner region is from older populations of stars.
For more information, visit: hubblesite.org/contents/news-releases/2018/news-2018-48.h...
Credit: NASA, ESA, and Judy Schmidt
This spiral galaxy is known for its thick dust lane near its nucleus that gives it the appearance of a bruised eye. The Black Eye Galaxy (M64) is 17 million light years away in the constellation Coma Berenices. Also known as "The Sleeping Beauty Galaxy", this image was taken from Mesquite Springs Campground in Death Valley, CA.
This is a stack of 12 unguided 125s subframes with a Celestron Edge HD 9.25" scope at f/2.3 with Hyperstar and an Atik 314L+ color CCD. Initial preprocessing and stacking in Nebulosity; final processing in PixInsight and PS CS 5.1.
Image center is at RA 12h 56m 43.03s, DEC +21° 40' 57.01"
This image of an archetypal spiral galaxy was captured by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.
The subject of this image is known as NGC 691, and it can be found some 120 million light-years from Earth. This galaxy was one of thousands of objects discovered by astronomer William Herschel during his prolific decades-long career spent hunting for, characterizing and cataloging a wide array of the galaxies and nebulas visible throughout the night sky — almost 200 years before Hubble was even launched.
The intricate detail visible in this image would likely be extraordinary to Herschel. Hubble was able to capture an impressive level of structure within NGC 691’s layers of stars and spiraling arms — all courtesy of the telescope’s high-resolution Wide Field Camera 3.
For more information: www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2020/hubble-spots-a-sp...
Text credit: ESA (European Space Agency)
Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, A. Riess et al.
Working with astronomical image processors at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Md., renowned astro-photographer Robert Gendler has taken science data from the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) archive and combined it with his own ground-based observations to assemble a photo illustration of the magnificent spiral galaxy M106.
Gendler retrieved archival Hubble images of M106 to assemble a mosaic of the center of the galaxy. He then used his own and fellow astro-photographer Jay GaBany's observations of M106 to combine with the Hubble data in areas where there was less coverage, and finally, to fill in the holes and gaps where no Hubble data existed.
The center of the galaxy is composed almost entirely of HST data taken by the Advanced Camera for Surveys, Wide Field Camera 3, and Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 detectors. The outer spiral arms are predominantly HST data colorized with ground-based data taken by Gendler's and GaBany's 12.5-inch and 20-inch telescopes, located at very dark remote sites in New Mexico. The image also reveals the optical component of the "anomalous arms" of M106, seen here as red, glowing hydrogen emission.
Robert Gendler is a physician by profession but has been active in astrophotography for two decades. Robert started taking astro-images from his driveway in suburban Connecticut. He then spent several years imaging remotely from places like New Mexico and Western Australia. More recently, Robert has been spending his time assembling hybrid images from multiple data sources including the Hubble Legacy Archive. Many of these images have been featured on "Astronomy Picture of the Day" and in various books and magazines.
This portrait of M106 contains only the inner structure around the halo and nucleus of this Seyfert II active galaxy. Large amounts of gas from the galaxy are thought to be falling into and fueling a supermassive black hole contained in the nucleus. Also known as NGC 4258, M106 lies 23.5 million light-years away, in the constellation Canes Venatici.
The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and the European Space Agency. NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, Md., conducts Hubble science operations. STScI is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., in Washington.
For images and more information about M106, visit:
Credit: NASA, ESA, the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA), and R. Gendler (for the Hubble Heritage Team) Acknowledgment: J. GaBany
[source: www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/hubble/science/m106.html ]