Astronomy Picture of the Day

                         Astronomy Picture of the Day

    Discover the cosmos! [1] Each day a different image or photograph of our
 fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a
                           professional astronomer.

                                2019 March 15
                                      [2]
                              A View Toward M101
    Image Credit & Copyright [3] : Christoph Kaltseis [4] , CEDIC 2019 [5]

Explanation: Big, beautiful spiral galaxy M101 is one of the last entries in
Charles Messier's [6]  famous catalog, but definitely not one of the least [7]
. About 170,000 light-years across, this galaxy is enormous, almost twice the
size of our own Milky Way galaxy. M101 was also one of the original spiral
nebulae [8]  observed by Lord Rosse's large 19th century telescope, the
Leviathan [9]  of Parsontown. M101 shares [10] this modern telescopic field of
view with more distant background galaxies, foreground stars within the Milky
Way, and a companion dwarf galaxy NGC 5474 [11]  (lower right). The colors of
the Milky Way [12] stars can also be found in the starlight from the large
island universe. Its core is dominated by light from cool yellowish stars.
Along [13] its grand design spiral arms are the blue colors of hotter, young
stars mixed with obscuring dust lanes and pinkish star forming regions. Also
known as the Pinwheel Galaxy, M101 [14]  lies within the boundaries of the
northern constellation Ursa Major, about 23 million light-years away [15] .
Its companion NGC 5474 has likely been distorted by its past gravitational
interactions with the dominant M101.

                    Tomorrow's picture: southern sky view

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    Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff [27] (MTU [28] ) & Jerry Bonnell [29]
                                  (UMCP [30] )
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Site notes:
  [1] archivepix.html
  [2] image/1903/M101n8_4tp_Kaltseis.jpg
  [3] lib/about_apod.html#srapply
  [4] http://www.cedic.at/en/cedic_slt.php
  [5] http://www.cedic.at/en/cedic.php
  [6] ap000311.html
  [7] http://www.messier.seds.org/m/m102d.html
  [8] http://www.messier.seds.org/more/m101_rosse.h...
  [9] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leviathan_of_Pa...
  [10] https://blog.naver.com/omololee/221260541583
  [11] http://www.spacetelescope.org/images/potw1424...
  [12] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galaxy#Milky_Wa...
  [13] https://arxiv.org/abs/1608.00969
  [14] http://www.messier.seds.org/m/m101.html
  [15] http://hubblesite.org/video/517/news_release/...
  [16] ap190314.html
  [17] archivepix.html
  [18] lib/apsubmit2015.html
  [19] lib/aptree.html
  [20] http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/apod/apod...
  [21] calendar/allyears.html
  [22] /apod.rss
  [23] lib/edlinks.html
  [24] lib/about_apod.html
  [25] http://asterisk.apod.com/discuss_apod.php?dat...
  [26] ap190316.html
  [27] http://www.phy.mtu.edu/faculty/Nemiroff.html
  [28] http://www.phy.mtu.edu/
  [29] http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/htmltest/jbonnell...
  [30] http://www.astro.umd.edu/
  [31] lib/about_apod.html#srapply
  [32] http://www.nasa.gov/about/highlights/HP_Priva...
  [33] http://astrophysics.gsfc.nasa.gov/
  [34] http://www.nasa.gov/
  [35] http://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/
  [36] http://www.mtu.edu/

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