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Credit & Copyright: Tony and Daphne Hallas
Explanation:
Have
you heard a lot about ringed planets lately?
Well, consider this
gorgeous
celestial vista centered on the Milky Way's own
planetary
nebula M57, the famous
Ring Nebula.
The wide view is a composite of three exposures; one
to record the details of the inner roughly one
light-year span of the familiar
nebula, one to record
the surprisingly intricate but
faint outer rings of
glowing hydrogen gas, and one to pick up the
rich assortment of distant background galaxies.
By chance, one of the background galaxies,
IC 1296 at the upper left, is close
enough to show its barred, spiral structure making an attractive
visual comparison with M57.
Interestingly, though IC 1296 is 200 million light-years away
compared to only 2 thousand light-years for M57,
a faint ring is also apparent around the outer reaches
of the distant spiral galaxy.
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NASA Web Site Statements, Warnings, and Disclaimers
NASA Official: Jay Norris. Specific rights apply.
A service of: LHEA at NASA / GSFC
& Michigan Tech. U.
Based on Astronomy Picture
Of the Day
Publications with keywords: spiral galaxy
Publications with words: spiral galaxy
See also: