This spectacular image of the spiral galaxy Messier 106 (NGC 4258 or M106) taken by the 4-meter Nicholas U. Mayall Telescope at the Kitt Peak National Observatory in Arizona, USA, is the most detailed yet. It shows not only the spiral arms of the galaxy, the wisps of gas, and the lines of dust at its core, but also the bands of stars at its outer edges.
This spiral galaxy is located more than 20 million light years distant from Earth in the small northern constellation of Canes Venatici. It was discovered by Charles Messier’s observation assistant, Pierre Méchain, in 1781.
Messier 106 is similar in size and luminosity to our galactic neighbor, the Andromeda galaxy, although it measures more than 130,000 light years from edge to edge.
Regarding the black hole at its center, “in addition to consuming large amounts of gas and dust, the active black hole has warped the surrounding gas disk, churning up large amounts of material,” astronomers at NSF’s NOIRLab said. “This process has created the bright red streamers of gas emanating from the heart of Messier 106, visible in the center of the new image.”
“Messier 106 and its companions are framed by a variety of objects, from stars in the foreground to galaxies in the background. The stars in our own galaxy pick up the image, easily identified by the crisscrossing patterns of diffraction that surround them. In the background, Distant galaxies blur the image, some of them visible through Messier 106’s faint disk, “the astronomers clarify.
The image can be downloaded in various formats at high resolution up to 7000 × 7000 pixels.
