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Messier 64

This dusty galaxy is also known as the "Black Eye" or "Evil Eye" galaxy.

Distance

17 million light-years

Apparent Magnitude

9.8

constellation

Coma Berenices

object type

Spiral Galaxy

Black Eye Galaxy
This image taken with the Hubble Space Telescope features NGC 4826, otherwise known as M64— a spiral galaxy located 17 million light-years away in the constellation of Coma Berenices (Berenice’s Hair). This galaxy is often referred to as the “Black Eye” or “Evil Eye” Galaxy because of the dark band of dust that sweeps across one side of its bright nucleus. M64 is known by astronomers for its strange internal motion.
NASA and the Hubble Heritage Team (AURA/STScI); Acknowledgment: S. Smartt (Institute of Astronomy) and D. Richstone (U. Michigan)

Easily identified by the spectacular band of dark dust that partially obscures its bright core, Messier 64, or the Black Eye Galaxy, is characterized by its bizarre internal motion. The gas in the outer regions of this spiral galaxy is rotating in the opposite direction from the gas and stars in its inner regions. This strange behavior may be the result of a merger between M64 and a satellite galaxy over a billion years ago.

M64 at infrared wavelengths
In order to penetrate the dust clouds swirling around the center of M64, Hubble observed it at infrared wavelengths. The resulting snapshot reveals the galaxy’s bright core and star-forming clouds that surround it.
Torsten Boeker, Space Telescope Science Institute and NASA/ESA

New stars are forming in the region where the oppositely rotating gases collide, are compressed, and then contract. Particularly noticeable in this stunning Hubble image of the galaxy’s core are recently formed hot, blue stars and pink clouds of glowing hydrogen gas that fluoresce when exposed to ultraviolet light from the newly-formed stars.

English astronomer Edward Pigott first spotted M64 in March of 1719, just 12 days before German astronomer Johann Elert Bode, and roughly a year before Charles Messier independently rediscovered it in March of 1780. The galaxy is located 17 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Coma Berenices. The best time of year to look for the Black Eye Galaxy is May. Its apparent magnitude of 9.8 requires a moderately sized telescope and dark sky site.

For more information about Hubble’s observations of M64, see:

locator star chart for M64
This star chart for M64 represents the view from mid-northern latitudes for the given month and time.
Image courtesy of Stellarium
A star chart shows M64 as seen from the Southern Hemisphere in the northern night sky in May at 10pm.
This star chart for M64 represents the view from mid-southern latitudes for the given month and time.
Image courtesy of Stellarium

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