Astronomy Picture of the Day
Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.
2007 March 15
Credit & Copyright:SSRO-South (D.Goldman, J.Harvey, R.Gilbert, D.Verschatse) - PROMPT (D.Reichart)
Explanation:Distorted galaxy NGC 2442 can be found in the southern constellation of theflying fish, (Piscis)Volans. Located about 50 million light-years away, the galaxy's twospiral arms extending from a pronounced central bar give it anominous hook-shaped appearance. Thisstriking color image also shows obscuring dust lanes, young blue star clusters andreddish star forming regions surrounding a core of yellowish light from an older population of stars. But the star forming regions seem more concentrated along the drawn-out northern (top) spiral arm. The distorted structure is likely the result of aclose encounter with a smaller galaxy located just outside this telescopic field of view. The picturespans about 1/6 of a degree, or 150,000 light years at the estimated distanceof NGC 2442.
No comments:
Post a Comment