Recently, astronomers celebrated the 33rd launch anniversary of the Hubble Space Telescope. Launched back in 1990, the telescope provides us with amazing views and images.
The image shown is taken by Hubble, and it shows us two distant galaxies. On the left, we see a tilted galaxy known as NGC 4302 On the right, we see another galaxy called NGC 4298. These galaxies reside in the constellation Coma Berenices, which are 55 million light years away from us. Both of these galaxies were discovered by William Herschel in 1784.
Both of these galaxies are very similar – they are spiral galaxies which have arms of young stars that wind outward from the center. The bright arms are areas of strong star formation, and they have central bulges surrounded by a faint halo of stars and bars that extend from the bulges to the arms. Special thanks to Hubble Space Telescope for still doing great things!
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, and M. Mutchler (STScI)