Elliptical galaxy NGC 4365 with numerous young star clusters

Esahubble_heic0208a_1024

esahubble_heic0208a June 26th, 2002

Credit: ESA, ESO, Markus Kissler-Patig (ESO) & Thomas H. Puzia (University of Munich)

This colour image shows the elliptical galaxy NGC 4365. The image is a combination of two exposures taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope and one taken with ESO's Very Large Telescope. By combining these images a group of European and American astronomers have made a major discovery. They have identified a huge number of 'young' stellar clusters, in an old elliptical galaxy. For the first time, it has been possible to identify several distinct periods of star formation in a galaxy as old as this one. Elliptical galaxies have always been considered to have undergone one initial star-forming period and thereafter to be devoid of star formation. Most of the more than one hundred dots in the image are globular star clusters of which the 'young' population (only a few thousand million years old) make up about one half. The light from NGC 4365 is yellow-reddish - a clear indication of its main population of old stars (about 12 thousand million years old). In the background more distant galaxies are seen through the outskirts of NGC 4365. Many of these have redder colours due to their large distance and their larger red shift (due to the expansion of the Universe the further away a galaxy is, the faster it recedes from us and the redder its light therefore becomes). NGC 4365 is located in the constellation of Pegasus at an approximate distance of 55 million light-years. This picture is composed of two images obtained with Hubble's Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 on 31 May 1996, and one obtained with the multi-mode ISAAC instrument on the 8.2-m VLT ANTU telescope at the ESO Paranal Observatory (Chile). The images were taken through a green filter (V-band, 2200 seconds, coloured blue), a red filter (I-Band, 2300 seconds, coloured green), and an infrared filter (K-band, 9500 seconds, 0.6 arcseconds seeing, coloured red).

Provider: Hubble Space Telescope | ESA

Image Source: https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/heic0208a/

Curator: ESA/Hubble, Garching bei München, Germany

Image Use Policy: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

Image Details

Image Type
Observation
Object Name
NGC 4365
Subject - Local Universe
Galaxy > Type > Elliptical
Esahubble_heic0208a_128
 

Position Details

Position (ICRS)
RA = 12h 24m 26.4s
DEC = 7° 19’ 18.2”
Orientation
North is 71.4° CW
Field of View
2.3 x 2.4 arcminutes
Constellation
Virgo

Color Mapping

  Telescope Spectral Band Wavelength
Red VLT (ISAAC) Infrared (K) -
Green Hubble (WFPC2) Infrared (I) -
Blue Hubble (WFPC2) Optical (V) -
Esahubble_heic0208a_1280
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ID
heic0208a
Subject Category
C.5.1.4  
Subject Name
NGC 4365
Credits
ESA, ESO, Markus Kissler-Patig (ESO) & Thomas H. Puzia (University of Munich)
Release Date
2002-06-26T15:00:00
Lightyears
Redshift
Reference Url
https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/heic0208a/
Type
Observation
Image Quality
Distance Notes
Distance in light years from NED
Facility
Very Large Telescope (VLT), Hubble Space Telescope, Hubble Space Telescope
Instrument
ISAAC, WFPC2, WFPC2
Color Assignment
Red, Green, Blue
Band
Infrared, Infrared, Optical
Bandpass
K, I, V
Central Wavelength
Start Time
Integration Time
9500, 2300, 2200
Dataset ID
Notes
Coordinate Frame
ICRS
Equinox
J2000
Reference Value
186.110088216, 7.32173233788
Reference Dimension
1854.0, 1920.0
Reference Pixel
927.0, 960.0
Scale
-2.05650915367e-05, 2.05650915367e-05
Rotation
-71.440000000000012
Coordinate System Projection:
TAN
Quality
Full
FITS Header
Notes
Creator (Curator)
ESA/Hubble
URL
http://www.spacetelescope.org/
Name
Email
Telephone
Address
Karl-Schwarzschild-Strasse 2
City
Garching bei München
State/Province
Postal Code
D-85748
Country
Germany
Rights
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
Publisher
ESA/Hubble
Publisher ID
esahubble
Resource ID
heic0208a
Metadata Date
2003-12-09T17:08:59+01:00
Metadata Version
1.1
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Detailed color mapping information coming soon...

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There is no distance meta data in this image.

 

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