The Triangulum Galaxy, the second
closest spiral swirl of stars to our own Milky Way, shines in blues and golds in
this ultraviolet image.
Also known as M33, the
Triangulum Galaxy, appears as a many armed disk thanks it its moderate
inclination. The Andromeda Galaxy – the Milky Way’s closest galactic neighbor –
appears nearly edge-on.
In this image, the Galactic
Evolution Explorer spacecraft photographed Triangulum in the ultraviolet region
of the light spectrum to track emissions from the atmospheres of hot stars. Most
of the stars appear to have formed in the past few hundred million years, and
give researchers a point of reference for the galaxy’s composition, astronomers
said.
-- SPACE.com Staff
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
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