Compass and Scale Image of M31 PHAT+PHAST Mosaic

Photo mosaic of Andromeda galaxy and five regions of interest. A spiral galaxy spreads across the width. It’s tilted nearly edge-on to our line of sight, appearing as an extreme oval on its side. Its borders are jagged because the image is a mosaic of smaller, square images. The outer edges are blue, while the inner two-thirds are yellowish with a bright, central core. Dark, dusty clouds wrap around the outer half of the galaxy’s disk. At 10 o'clock, a smaller dwarf elliptical galaxy forms a fuzzy, yellow blob. There are about 200 million stars within the image. The background of space is black. There are what appears to be steps toward the bottom, mainly toward the middle, which indicates where no data were taken. Interesting regions: (a) Clusters of bright blue stars embedded within the galaxy; background galaxies seen much farther away; (b) NGC 206, a concentration of bright blue stars; (c) A young cluster of blue newborn stars; (d) The satellite galaxy M32; (e) Dark dust lanes across myriad yellow stars.
Compass and Scale Image of M31 PHAT+PHAST Mosaic

The Andromeda galaxy, a spiral galaxy, spreads across the width. It is tilted nearly edge-on to our line of sight so that it appears as an extreme oval on its side. The borders of the galaxy are jagged because the image is a mosaic of smaller, square images. The outer edges are blue, while the inner two-thirds are yellowish with a bright, central core. Dark, dusty filamentary clouds wrap around the outer half of the galaxy’s disk. At 10 o'clock, a smaller dwarf elliptical galaxy forms a fuzzy, yellow blob. Hubble's sharp vision distinguishes about 200 million stars within the image. The background of space is black. There are what appears to be steps toward the bottom, mainly toward the middle, which indicates where no data were taken. Interesting regions include: (a) Clusters of bright blue stars embedded within the galaxy, background galaxies seen much farther away, and photo-bombing by a couple bright foreground stars that are actually inside our Milky Way; (b) NGC 206 the most conspicuous star cloud in Andromeda containing a concentration of bright blue stars; (c) A young cluster of blue newborn stars; (d) The satellite galaxy M32, that may be the residual core of a galaxy that once collided with Andromeda. The central core is a yellowish blob of unresolved stars; (e) Dark dust lanes across myriad yellow stars.

About The Object

Object Name
M31, Andromeda Galaxy, NGC 224
Object Description
Spiral Galaxy
R.A. Position
00:42
Dec. Position
+41:15
Constellation
Andromeda
Distance
2.5 million light-years

About The Data

Instrument
ACS
Filters
F475W, F814W

About The Image

Color Info
This image is a composite of separate exposures acquired by the ACS instrument on the Hubble Space Telescope. Several filters were used to sample broad wavelength ranges. The color results from assigning different hues (colors) to each monochromatic (grayscale) image associated with an individual filter. In this case, the assigned colors are: Blue: F475W (g) Yellow: F814W (I)

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