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Credit & Copyright: Fabian Neyer
Explanation:
Find the Big Dipper and
follow the handle away from the dipper's bowl
until you get to the last bright star.
Then, just slide your telescope a little south and west and
you'll
come upon this stunning pair of interacting galaxies,
the 51st entry
in Charles Messier's famous catalog.
Perhaps the
original spiral
nebula,
the large galaxy with
well defined spiral structure is also cataloged as NGC 5194.
Its
spiral
arms and dust lanes
clearly sweep in front of its companion galaxy (left),
NGC 5195.
The pair are about 31 million light-years distant and
officially lie within the angular boundaries of
the small constellation
Canes
Venatici.
In direct telescopic views, M51 looks faint and fuzzy to the eye.
But this remarkably deep image
shows off details of the interacting galaxy's
striking colors and galactic tidal debris.
The image includes nearly 90 hours of narrowband data
that also reveals a vast glowing cloud of reddish ionized hydrogen gas
discovered in the M51 system.
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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: M 51 - Whirlpool galaxy
Publications with words: M 51 - Whirlpool galaxy
See also: