APOD
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.
A Magellanic Starfield
Explanation: Stars of many types and colors are visible in this Hubble Space Telescope vista of the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). Over 10,000 stars are visible -- the brightest of which are giant stars . Were our Sun 170,000 light-years distant and among these stars , it would hardly be discernable . By contrast, only a few thousand stars are individually visible at night with the unaided eye, and many of these lie within only a few hundred light-years. Typically, the light we see from nearby stars left during the age of our great-grand-parents, while light from LMC stars started its journey before the dawn of recorded human history.
| Date | December 13, 1999 |
|---|---|
| Credit | Credit: Sally Heap (NASA/ GSFC) et al. & the Hubble Heritage Team (AURA/ STScI/ NASA) |
| Authors & editors: | Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP) |
| A service of: |
ASD at NASA / GSFC, NASA Science Activation & Michigan Tech. U. |



