Located in the constellation of Leo, the object NC 2906 is a spiral galaxy located about 115 million light years distant from Earth.
The image was captured by the Hubble Space Telescope's Wide Field Camera 3, an instrument installed in 2009 during the telescope's final service mission. Hubble observed this galaxy in search of the light that fades after the recent events of stellar explosions known as supernovae.
What do the colors mean in this image?
The blue specks that can be seen scattered throughout this galaxy are massive young star clusters, emitting hot radiation and turning blue as they burn their fuel at immense speed. The orange stripes are a mixture of older stars that have swelled and cooled, and low-mass stars that were never especially hot. Due to their much lower temperatures, these stars emit cooler reddish radiation.
This galaxy has a diameter of 35,000 light years and was discovered by the German-born British astronomer William Herschel on December 28, 1785.
Reference: NASA
