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Sombrero Galaxy: Visible and Infrared Views

The Sombrero Galaxy has a distinctive ring of dust that circles a smooth bulge of stars. The galaxy's dust and inner flat disk are very clear in the infrared. The Sombrero Galaxy may be a spiral galaxy like the Milky Way, but because of its extremely edge-on orientation, we see it in the flat pancake aspect. Our Milky Way would also have this appearance if viewed from the side angle.

Optical: The dust ring is partially hidden in the galaxy's visible-light glow.

Infrared: The galaxy's dust and inner flat disk are clear when viewing infrared.

  • Release Date
    October 29, 2018
  • Credit
    Optical: NASA/Hubble Space Telescope/Hubble Heritage Team (STScI); Infrared: NASA/JPL-Caltech/R. Kennicutt (University of Arizona) and the SINGS Team.

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Last Updated
Aug 17, 2025
Contact
Media

Claire Andreoli
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Greenbelt, Maryland
claire.andreoli@nasa.gov

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