Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Arp 286: Trio in Virgo

NASA ^ | Wednesday, July 06, 2016 | (see photo credit)

[SunkenCiv]

Explanation: A remarkable telescopic composition in yellow and blue, this scene features a trio of interacting galaxies almost 90 million light-years away, toward the constellation Virgo. On the right, two, spiky, foreground Milky Way stars echo the trio galaxy hues, a reminder that stars in our own galaxy are like those in the distant island universes. With sweeping spiral arms and obscuring dust lanes, NGC 5566 is enormous, about 150,000 light-years across. Just above it lies small, blue NGC 5569. Near center, the third galaxy, NGC 5560, is multicolored and apparently stretched and distorted by its interaction with NGC 5566. The galaxy trio is also included in Halton Arp's 1966 Atlas of Peculiar Galaxies as Arp 286. Of course, such cosmic interactions are now appreciated as a common part of the evolution of galaxies.

[SunkenCiv]

[Credit and Copyright: CHART32 Team, Processing Johannes Schedler]

[SunkenCiv]

Halton Christian "Chip" Arp (March 21, 1927 – December 28, 2013)

The Big One

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[Diana in Wisconsin]

Think we could talk Hillary! into campaigning for Queen of the Galaxy on one of those? ;)

Very beautiful.

*BUMP*

[sargon]

Every time I look at one of these pictures, it's a humbling experience.

What beauty and enormity! Distances and sizes which we can't even comprehend...

And if Hillary wins, she'll be decalred Queen of it all...

Vote Trump!

[SunkenCiv]

/rememberinnovember