Islands of stars in the river

Esahubble_potw1103a_1024

esahubble_potw1103a January 17th, 2011

Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA

The spiral galaxy NGC 1345 and its loose and ragged arms dominate this rich image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. It is a member of the Eridanus Galaxy Cluster a group of about 70 galaxies that lies 85 million light-years away in the constellation of Eridanus (the River). This region of the night sky is well populated with bright galaxies, with the Fornax Cluster of galaxies also nearby on the celestial sphere, although the two clusters are actually separated by about 20 million light-years. Collectively, they are known as the Fornax Supercluster or the Southern Supercluster. John Herschel discovered NGC 1345 in 1835 from South Africa. He described it as small and very faint and it is still far from easy to see it even with quite a large amateur telescope, where it appears as a small, circular fuzz. Apart from the main galaxy that dominates the picture, lots more distant galaxies of many shapes and sizes can be seen in this image, some shining right through the foreground galaxy. NGC 1345 itself features an elongated bar extending from the nucleus and spiral arms that emanate outwards, making it a barred spiral type. Classifying galaxy shapes is an important part of astronomical research as it tells us much about how the Universe has evolved. But computers arent really ideal for the task; people are much better at recognising shapes, which is why a citizen-science project called Galaxy Zoo: Hubble is asking members of the public to help sift through the vast archive of images and classify galaxies by type. If you would like to join the cause, theres a link to the project below. This picture was created from images taken with the Wide Field Channel of Hubbles Advanced Camera for Surveys. Images taken through a blue filter (F435W) were coloured blue and images through a near-infrared filter (F814W) were coloured red. The exposure times were 17.5 minutes per filter in total and the field of view is 3.2 by 1.6 arcminutes. Links http://www.galaxyzoo.org/

Provider: Hubble Space Telescope | ESA

Image Source: http://www.spacetelescope.org/images/potw1103a/

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 1345
Subject - Local Universe
Galaxy > Type > Barred
Esahubble_potw1103a_128
 

Position Details

Position (ICRS)
RA = 3h 29m 31.8s
DEC = -17° 46’ 44.5”
Orientation
North is 85.9° CCW
Field of View
2.9 x 1.6 arcminutes
Constellation
Eridanus

Color Mapping

  Telescope Spectral Band Wavelength
Blue Hubble (ACS) Optical (B) -
Green Hubble (ACS) Optical (Pseudogreen (V+I)) -
Red Hubble (ACS) Infrared (I) -
Esahubble_potw1103a_1280
×
ID
potw1103a
Subject Category
C.5.1.2  
Subject Name
NGC 1345
Credits
ESA/Hubble & NASA
Release Date
2011-01-17T10:00:00
Lightyears
Redshift
Reference Url
http://www.spacetelescope.org/images/potw1103a/
Type
Observation
Image Quality
Distance Notes
Facility
Hubble Space Telescope, Hubble Space Telescope, Hubble Space Telescope
Instrument
ACS, ACS, ACS
Color Assignment
Blue, Green, Red
Band
Optical, Optical, Infrared
Bandpass
B, Pseudogreen (V+I), I
Central Wavelength
Start Time
Integration Time
Dataset ID
Notes
Coordinate Frame
ICRS
Equinox
J2000
Reference Value
52.3825121921, -17.779039235
Reference Dimension
3492.0, 1919.0
Reference Pixel
1746.0, 959.5
Scale
-1.38801253876e-05, 1.38801253876e-05
Rotation
85.9000000000001
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
potw1103a
Metadata Date
2011-01-04T09:58:40+01:00
Metadata Version
1.1
×

 

Detailed color mapping information coming soon...

×

There is no distance meta data in this image.

 

Providers | Sign In