Astronomy Picture of the Day - IC 342: Hidden Galaxy in Camelopardalis

NASA ^ | 8 Jan, 2025 | Image Credit & Copyright: Gaetan Maxant

[MtnClimber]

Explanation: Similar in size to large, bright spiral galaxies in our neighborhood, IC 342 is a mere 10 million light-years distant toward the long-necked, northern constellation Camelopardalis. A sprawling island universe, IC 342 would otherwise be a prominent galaxy in our night sky, but it is hidden from clear view and only glimpsed through the veil of stars, gas and dust clouds along the plane of our own Milky Way galaxy. Even though IC 342's light is dimmed and reddened by intervening cosmic clouds, this sharp telescopic image traces the galaxy's own obscuring dust, young star clusters, and glowing star forming regions along spiral arms that wind far from the galaxy's core. IC 342 has undergone a recent burst of star formation activity and is close enough to have influenced the evolution of the local group of galaxies and the Milky Way.

[MtnClimber]

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For more detail go to the link and click on the image for a high definition image. You can then move the magnifying glass cursor then click to zoom in and click again to zoom out. When zoomed in you can scan by moving the side bars on the bottom and right side of the image.

[MtnClimber]

[MtnClimber]

Pinging the APOD list

🪐 🌟 🌌 🍔

[Scarlett156]

WHEEEEEE!!!!

[SkyDancer]

You wonder how many civilizations are in that galaxy.

[NorthMountain]

And how many of them have hawt alien wimmens ...

[BenLurkin]

Yes!

[Diogenesis]

[Magnum44]

[ComputerGuy]

Camelopardalis

Is that with one hump or two?

[PGalt]

https://nextspaceflight.com/

For anyone interested.

[StevenWH]

Latin for giraffe.

[Alas Babylon!]

Look here:

[Scarlett156]

Great pic.