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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

See Explanation. Clicking on the picture will download the highest resolution version available.

Galaxy Dwingeloo 1 Emerges

Explanation: If you look closely at the center of the above photograph, you will see a spiral galaxy behind the field of stars. Named Dwingeloo 1 , this nearby galaxy was only discovered recently (1994) because much of its light was obscured by dust , gas and bright stars of our own Milky Way galaxy . In fact, all the individually discernible stars in the above photograph are in our Galaxy. Dwingeloo 1 turned out to be a large galaxy located only five times as distant as the closest major galaxy - M31 .

Date October 17, 1995
Credit Credit: Dwingeloo Obscured Galaxy Survey team,
S. Hughes, & S. Maddox, Isaac Newton Telescope (RGO)
Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation & Michigan Tech. U.