NASA's Hubble Space Telescope snapped these two views of the heart of the galaxy M82. The image at left was taken in visible light; the picture at right, in infrared light. In the infrared view, the telescope's Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer peered through thick dust lanes to find some of the galaxy's more than 100 super star clusters. The clusters are the larger pink and yellow dots scattered throughout the picture. They were formed during a violent collision with the galaxy M81 about 600 million years ago. The galaxy is 12 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Ursa Major. The pictures were taken Sept. 15, 1997.
Credits
NASA, ESA, R. de Grijs (Institute of Astronomy, Cambridge, UK)| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | M82, NGC 3034 |
| Object Description | Irregular Galaxy |
| R.A. Position | 09h 55m 52.18s |
| Dec. Position | 69° 40' 48.79" |
| Constellation | Ursa Major |
| Distance | About 3.6 Mpc (12 million light-years) |
| Dimensions | The visible portion of the HST M82 image is ~210 arcseconds (3.7 kpc) along the diagonal. |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description | The release image of M82 was created from WFPC2 archived HST data from the following science Proposals: (WFPC2/NICMOS observations): R. O'Connell (Univ. Virginia). Principal Astronomers: R. de Grijs (Inst. of Astronomy, Cambridge, UK), R. O'Connell (Univ. Virginia), J. Gallagher (Univ. Wisc-Madison), D. Hunter (Lowell Obs.) : P. Shopbell (Cal Tech). Principal Astronomers: P. Shopbell (Cal Tech), R. Dufour (Rice Univ.), J. Cohen (Cal Tech), J. Bland-Hawthorn (AAO) |
| Instrument | HST>WFPC2 (left), HST>NICMOS (right) |
| Exposure Dates | March 16, 1997; September 15, 1997; August 28, 1998, Exposure Time: 8.7 hours |
| Filters | Prop 7446 (WFPC2): F814W (I), F555W (V), F439W (B) Prop 7446 (NICMOS): F110W, F160W Prop 6826 (WFPC2): F656N (Ha) |
| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | A name or catalog number that astronomers use to identify an astronomical object. |
| Object Description | The type of astronomical object. |
| R.A. Position | Right ascension – analogous to longitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Dec. Position | Declination – analogous to latitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Constellation | One of 88 recognized regions of the celestial sphere in which the object appears. |
| Distance | The physical distance from Earth to the astronomical object. Distances within our solar system are usually measured in Astronomical Units (AU). Distances between stars are usually measured in light-years. Interstellar distances can also be measured in parsecs. |
| Dimensions | The physical size of the object or the apparent angle it subtends on the sky. |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description |
|
| Instrument | The science instrument used to produce the data. |
| Exposure Dates | The date(s) that the telescope made its observations and the total exposure time. |
| Filters | The camera filters that were used in the science observations. |
| About The Image | |
| Image Credit | The primary individuals and institutions responsible for the content. |
| Publication Date | The date and time the release content became public. |
| Color Info | A brief description of the methods used to convert telescope data into the color image being presented. |
| Orientation | The rotation of the image on the sky with respect to the north pole of the celestial sphere. |
