Spiral key to Universe's expansion

Esahubble_potw1112a_1024

esahubble_potw1112a March 21st, 2011

Credit: NASA, ESA, A. Riess (STScI/JHU), L. Macri (Texas A & M University), and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)

This view from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shows the beautiful spiral galaxy NGC 5584. This galaxy has played a key role in a new study that measures the expansion rate of the Universe to greater accuracy than ever before. NGC 5584 was first spotted as a faint glow in the constellation of Virgo by the great visual observer E. E. Barnard, back in 1881, using just a 12.5-cm telescope. But, by bringing the power of Hubble to bear, the galaxy can be resolved into thousands of separate stars. Some of these stars vary in brightness and are classified as Cepheids. These are brilliant pulsating stars with a remarkable property once the time it takes a Cepheid to brighten and fade is known, then it is possible to find how bright it actually is. When this information is combined with a measurement of how bright the star appears it is easy to work out how far away the star actually lies. This method is the most accurate and effective way to measure the distances to most nearby galaxies. This trick has now been used as part of a major new study of the expansion rate of the Universe, led by Adam Riess at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore. By studying many Cepheids in several galaxies the team has been able to refine our knowledge of this expansion rate, expressed as a number known as Hubbles constant, to an accuracy of 3.3 percent. In addition to many Cepheids NGC 5584 was also recently the site of a type Ia supernova. These dramatic explosions of white dwarf stars are used as reference beacons for mapping the expansion, and acceleration, of the more remote Universe so this galaxy is a very valuable link between the two distance scales. More details of this major study, and its significance for the understanding of dark energy, can be found in a press release from NASA: https://hubblesite.org/contents/news-releases/2011/news-2011-08.html. This picture was created from many exposures taken with Hubbles Wide Field Channel 3. Images through three filters have been combined to create this composite picture. Light detected through a filter that transmits most visible light (F350LP) is coloured white, light coming through a yellow/green filter (F555W) is coloured blue and near infrared light (the F814W filter) is coloured red. The field of view 2.4 arcminutes across and the total exposure time was 20.8 hours.

Provider: Hubble Space Telescope | ESA

Image Source: https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/potw1112a/

Curator: ESA/Hubble, Garching bei München, None, Germany

Image Use Policy: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

Image Details

Image Type
Observation
Object Name
NGC 5584
Subject - Local Universe
Star > Type > Variable
Galaxy > Type > Spiral
Esahubble_potw1112a_128
 

Position Details

Position (ICRS)
RA = 14h 22m 23.5s
DEC = 0° 23’ 9.9”
Orientation
North is 204.3° CCW
Field of View
2.3 x 2.7 arcminutes
Constellation
Virgo

Color Mapping

  Telescope Spectral Band Wavelength
Grayscale Hubble (WFC3) Optical 350.0 nm
Red Hubble (WFC3) Infrared (I) 814.0 nm
Blue Hubble (WFC3) Optical (V) 555.0 nm
Spectrum_base
Grayscale
Red
Blue
Esahubble_potw1112a_1280
×
ID
potw1112a
Subject Category
C.3.2.1   C.5.1.1  
Subject Name
NGC 5584
Credits
NASA, ESA, A. Riess (STScI/JHU), L. Macri (Texas A & M University), and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)
Release Date
2011-03-21T10:00:00
Lightyears
Redshift
Reference Url
https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/potw1112a/
Type
Observation
Image Quality
Distance Notes
Facility
Hubble Space Telescope, Hubble Space Telescope, Hubble Space Telescope
Instrument
WFC3, WFC3, WFC3
Color Assignment
Grayscale, Red, Blue
Band
Optical, Infrared, Optical
Bandpass
-, I, V
Central Wavelength
350, 814, 555
Start Time
Integration Time
Dataset ID
Notes
Coordinate Frame
ICRS
Equinox
J2000
Reference Value
215.597726068, -0.386076889838
Reference Dimension
3539.0, 4016.0
Reference Pixel
1769.0, 2008.0
Scale
-1.10282894818e-05, 1.10282894818e-05
Rotation
204.27999999999992
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
None
Postal Code
D-85748
Country
Germany
Rights
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
Publisher
ESA/Hubble
Publisher ID
esahubble
Resource ID
potw1112a
Metadata Date
2019-10-07T11:40:28.302550
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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