Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos!Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe isfeatured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.2024 December 13
M51: Tidal Streams and H-alpha Cliffs Image Credit &Copyright: The Deep Sky Collective -Tim Schaeffer,Carl Björk,Steeve Body,Fabian Neyer,Aki Jain,Ryan Wierckx,Paul Kent,Brian Valente,Antoine & Dalia Grelin,Nicolas Puig,Stephen Guberski,Mike Hamende,Julian Shapiro,John Dziuba,Mikhail Vasilev,Bogdan Borz,Adrien Keijzer Explanation: An intriguing pair of interacting galaxies, M51 isthe 51st entryin Charles Messier's famous catalog.Perhaps theoriginal spiralnebula,the large galaxy with whirlpool-like spiral structure seen nearlyface-on is also cataloged as NGC 5194.Its spiral arms and dust lanessweep in front of its smaller companion galaxy,NGC 5195.Some 31 million light-years distant,within the boundaries of the well-trained constellationCanesVenatici,M51 looks faint and fuzzy to the eye in direct telescopic views.But this remarkably deep imageshows off stunning details of the galaxy pair'sstriking colors and faintertidal streams.The image includes extensive narrowband data to highlighta vast reddish cloud of ionized hydrogen gas recently discovered in the M51system andknown to some as theH-alpha cliffs.Foreground dust clouds in the Milky Way and distant backgroundgalaxies are captured in the wide-field view.A continuingcollaboration of astro-imagersusing telescopes on planet Earth assembled over 3 weeks of exposure time tocreate this evolving portrait of M51. Watch:The 2024 Geminid Meteor Shower Tomorrow's picture: deep diving <| Archive| Submissions | Index| Search| Calendar| RSS| Education| About APOD| Discuss| > Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff(MTU) &Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)NASA Official: Amber StraughnSpecific rights apply.NASA WebPrivacy Policy and Important NoticesA service of:ASD atNASA /GSFC, NASA ScienceActivation& Michigan Tech. U.
