Captured by the NASA/ESA Hubble Area Telescope, the galaxy NGC 3344 presents itself face-on, permitting astronomers an in depth have a look at its intricate and stylish construction. And Hubble’s means to look at objects over a variety of various wavelengths reveals options that may in any other case stay invisible.
Spiral galaxies are among the most spectacular sights within the sky, however to an observer they don’t all look the identical. Some are seen edge-on, giving astronomers a wonderful thought of the galaxy’s vertical construction; others are seen at an angle, offering a touch of the dimensions and construction of the spiral arms; whereas others are seen face-on, showcasing their arms and vivid core in all their magnificence.
Roughly 20 million light-years away within the constellation of Leo Minor (the Lion Cub), NGC 3344 is seen from a wide ranging face-on perspective. Half the dimensions of the Milky Method, it’s categorized as a weakly barred spiral galaxy. The central bar is simply seen on this picture, taken with Hubble’s Vast Area Digicam 3: an elongated lane of stars, trailing by means of the nucleus of the galaxy. Astronomers estimate that two-thirds of all spiral galaxies are barred, together with our personal Milky Method.
Hubble’s capability to look at celestial objects in several wavelengths permits us to see extra than simply the spiral arms sweeping out loosely across the centre in a stunning whorl. This picture is a composite of photographs taken by means of completely different filters, starting from the close to ultraviolet, to the optical and the near-infrared. Collectively they present a extra full image of the galaxy than the human eye alone might probably see.
The swirling spiral arms are the birthplace of latest stars, whose excessive temperatures make them shine blue, leading to them being simply identifiable on this picture. Clouds of mud and gasoline distributed by means of the spiral arms — glowing pink on this picture — are reservoirs of fabric for much more stars. The intense jewel-like stars on the left of the image, nonetheless, are a lot nearer to Earth — they belong to our personal galaxy and simply occurred to photobomb this Hubble picture.
Whereas its face-on orientation reveals a lot about NGC 3344’s detailed construction, this galaxy remains to be enigmatic; astronomers have seen that a few of its outer stars are transferring in an odd method. Typically, the excessive focus of stars within the centre of a galaxy can have an effect on the actions of the outer stars, however this doesn’t appear to be the case in NGC 3344. Astronomers suspect that these weirdly behaving outer stars may very well have been stolen from one other galaxy, after a detailed encounter that passed off way back.
The placement of NGC 3344 can be intriguing. Our galaxy is a part of the Native Group, which is made up of roughly 40 different galaxies, with the Andromeda Galaxy being the biggest member. However NGC 3344 will not be a part of an area galactic neighbourhood like we’re. It’s really a part of a small spur that leads off the bigger Virgo Supercluster — a gargantuan assortment of a number of thousand galaxies.
But it surely stands out from these 1000’s of galaxies due to its magnificence, which highlights to us the class of the Universe.
Picture Credit score: ESA/Hubble, NASA
Rationalization from: https://www.spacetelescope.org/information/heic1803/
