Suggested Searches

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.

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

Spiral Galaxy NGC 2841

Explanation: Some 50 million light-years distant, spiral galaxy NGC 2841 can be found in the northern constellation of Ursa Major . This sharp view of the gorgeous island universe shows off a striking yellow nucleus and galactic disk with tightly wound spiral arms. NGC 2841 has a diameter of over 150,000 light-years, even larger than our own Milky Way Galaxy. The galaxy's dust lanes and turbulent star-forming regions are found along the spiral arms, but X-ray images suggest that resulting winds and stellar explosions create plumes of hot gas extending into a halo around NGC 2841. Of course , the prominent stars with a spiky appearance in the picture are close foreground objects within the Milky Way and not associated with NGC 2841 .

Date March 29, 2008
Credit Credit & Copyright: Johannes Schedler ( Panther Observatory )
Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation & Michigan Tech. U.