Galaxies, Stars, & Black Holes Research

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Two spiral galaxies take the shape of a colorful beaded mask that sits above the nose. The galaxy at left, IC 2163, is smaller, taking up a little over a quarter of the view. The galaxy at right, NGC 2207, takes up half the view, with its spiral arms reaching the edges. IC 2163 has a bright orange core, with two prominent spiral arms that rotate counter clockwise and become straighter towards the ends, the left side extending almost to the edge. Its arms are a mix of pink, white, and blue, with an area that takes the shape of an eyelid appearing whitest. NGC 2207 has a very bright core. Overall, it appears to have larger, thicker spiral arms that spin counter clockwise. This galaxy also contains more and larger blue areas of star formation that poke out like holes from the pink spiral arms. In the middle, the galaxies’ arms appear to overlap. The edges show the black background of space, including extremely distant galaxies that look like orange and red smudges, and a few foreground stars.

‘Blood-Soaked’ Eyes: NASA’s Webb, Hubble Examine Galaxy Pair

5 min read

Stare deeply at these galaxies. They appear as if blood is pumping through the top of a flesh-free face. The…

Article1 week ago
Hundreds of small galaxies against the black background of space. Several white spiral galaxies are near image center. Most of the galaxies are various shades of orange and red, and many are too tiny to discern a shape. A handful of foreground stars show Webb's six diffraction spikes.

Webb Finds Early Galaxies Weren’t Too Big for Their Britches After All

5 min read

It got called the crisis in cosmology. But now astronomers can explain some surprising recent discoveries. When astronomers got their…

Article3 months ago

How NASA’s Roman Space Telescope Will Illuminate Cosmic Dawn

6 min read

Today, enormous stretches of space are crystal clear, but that wasn’t always the case. During its infancy, the universe was…

Article4 months ago

Coming in Hot — NASA’s Chandra Checks Habitability of Exoplanets

4 min read

This graphic shows a three-dimensional map of stars near the Sun. These stars are close enough that they could be…

Article5 months ago

NASA’s Roman Mission Gets Cosmic ‘Sneak Peek’ From Supercomputers

6 min read

Researchers are diving into a synthetic universe to help us better understand the real one. Using supercomputers at the U.S.…

Article5 months ago

How NASA’s Roman Mission Will Hunt for Primordial Black Holes

5 min read

Astronomers have discovered black holes ranging from a few times the Sun’s mass to tens of billions. Now a group…

Article6 months ago