Astronomy Picture of the Day -- The Fornax Cluster of Galaxies

NASA ^ | Saturday, June 11, 2016 | (see photo credit)

[SunkenCiv]

Explanation: Named for the southern constellation toward which most of its galaxies can be found, the Fornax Cluster is one of the closest clusters of galaxies. About 62 million light-years away, it is almost 20 times more distant than our neighboring Andromeda Galaxy, and only about 10 percent farther than the better known and more populated Virgo Galaxy Cluster. Seen across this two degree wide field-of-view, almost every yellowish splotch on the image is an elliptical galaxy in the Fornax cluster. A standout barred spiral galaxy NGC 1365 is visible on the lower right as a prominent Fornax cluster member. The spectacular image was taken by the VLT Survey Telescope at ESO's Paranal Observatory.

[SunkenCiv]

[Image Credit: European Southern Observatory; Acknowledgment: Aniello Grado and Luca Limatola ]

[SunkenCiv]

The Big One

join or quit list APoD 'blog post new APoD topic Astronomy Picture of the Day topic & keyword Astronomy Chat, Bloggers & keyword Science Chat, Bloggers & keyword NASA's APoD archive Calendar 1995-present APoD on your desktop

[Noumenon]

Galaxies like grains of sand... (Brian Aldiss)

[xp38]

Nice view of the spiral at the bottom of the photo.