Wallpaper Kingdom

Search This Blog

The Nile at Night seen from the International Space Station

February 13, 2018

Get link
Facebook
X
Pinterest
Email
Other Apps

The Nile at Night seen from the International Space Station

September 22, 2015

Image Credit: NASA

Get link
Facebook
X
Pinterest
Email
Other Apps

Comments

Spiral Galaxy NGC 1559

Roughly 50 million light-years away lies a somewhat overlooked little galaxy named NGC 1559. Pictured here by Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3, this barred spiral lies in the little-observed southern constellation of Reticulum (The Reticule). NGC 1559 has massive spiral arms chock-full of star formation, and is receding from us at a speed of about 1300 km/s. The galaxy contains the mass of around ten billion Suns — while this may sound like a lot, that is almost 100 times less massive than the Milky Way. Although NGC 1559 appears to sit near one of our nearest neighbours in the sky — the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), this is just a trick of perspective. In reality, NGC 1559 is physically nowhere near the LMC in space — in fact, it truly is a loner, lacking the company of any nearby galaxies or membership of any galaxy cluster. Despite its lack of cosmic companions, when this lonely galaxy has a telescope pointed in its direction, it puts on quite a show! NGC 1559 has hosted a variety of sp...

Interacting Galaxy NGC 5256

A riot of colour and light dances through this peculiarly shaped galaxy, NGC 5256. Its smoke-like plumes are flung out in all directions and the bright core illuminates the chaotic regions of gas and dust swirling through the galaxy’s centre. Its odd structure is due to the fact that this is not one galaxy, but two — in the process of a galactic collision. NGC 5256, also known as Markarian 266, is about 350 million light-years away from Earth, in the constellation of Ursa Major (The Great Bear). It is composed of two disc galaxies whose nuclei are currently just 13 000 light-years apart. Their constituent gas, dust, and stars are swirling together in a vigorous cosmic blender, igniting newborn stars in bright star formation regions across the galaxy. Interacting galaxies can be found throughout the Universe, producing a variety of intricate structures. Some are quiet, with one galaxy nonchalantly absorbing another. Others are violent and chaotic, switching on quasars, detonating supern...

Lenticular Galaxy NGC 5866

NGC 5866 is an edge-on galaxy that is tilted to our line-of-sight. It is classified as an S0 lenticular, due to its flat stellar disk and large ellipsoidal bulge. NGC 5866 lies in the Northern constellation Draco, at a distance of 44 million light-years (13.5 Megaparsecs). It has a diameter of roughly 60,000 light-years (18,400 parsecs). This Hubble image of NGC 5866 is a combination of blue, green and red observations taken with the Hubble Telescope's Advanced Camera for Surveys in November 2005. Image Credit: NASA, ESA, and The Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA) Explanation from: https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/opo0624b/

Powered by Blogger

The Nile at Night seen from the International Space Station

Comments

Post a Comment