Saturday, May 21, 2011

Edge-on Barred Spiral Galaxy NGC 4013 as seen by Hubble

Edge-on Barred Spiral Galaxy NGC 4013 as seen by Hubble
Click on the image for full resolution

The Hubble telescope has snapped this remarkable view of a perfectly edge-on galaxy, NGC 4013. This new Hubble picture reveals with exquisite detail huge clouds of dust and gas extending along, as well as far above, the galaxy's main disk. NGC 4013 is a spiral galaxy, similar to our Milky Way, lying some 55 million light-years from Earth in the direction of the constellation Ursa Major. Viewed face-on, it would look like a nearly circular pinwheel, but NGC 4013 happens to be seen edge-on from our vantage point. Even at 55 million light-years, the galaxy is larger than Hubble's field of view, and the image shows only a little more than half of the object, albeit with unprecedented detail.
Credit: NASA/ESA and The Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)

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