In this new image, the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has captured the brilliance of the spiral galaxy NGC 4951.
This Hubble image shows NGC 4951, a spiral galaxy around 49 million light-years away in the constellation of Virgo. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / D. Thilker / M. Zamani, ESA & Hubble.
NGC 4951 is located approximately 49 million light-years away from Earth in the constellation of Virgo.
Otherwise known as AGC 530015, IRAS 13025-0613 or LEDA 45246, this galaxy has a diameter of about 65,000 light-years.
It was discovered on April 17, 1784 by the German-born British astronomer William Herschel.
The new image of NGC 4951 is made up of observations from Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) in the ultraviolet, infrared, and optical parts of the spectrum.
It is based on data obtained through six filters. The color results from assigning different hues to each monochromatic image associated with an individual filter.
“The data used to make this image were captured by Hubble as part of a program to examine how matter and energy travel in nearby galaxies,” Hubble astronomers said in a statement.
“Galaxies continuously undergo a cycle of star formation whereby the gas in a galaxy forms molecular clouds, which collapse to create new stars, which then disperse the clouds they formed from with powerful radiation or stellar winds in a process called feedback.”
“The remaining gas is left to form new clouds elsewhere,” they added.
“This cycle of moving matter and energy determines how fast a galaxy forms stars and how quickly it burns through its supplies of gas — that is, how it evolves over the course of its life.”
“Understanding this evolution depends on the nebulae, stars and star clusters in the galaxy: when they formed and their past behavior.”
“Hubble has always excelled at measuring populations of stars, and the task of tracking gas and star formation in galaxies including NGC 4951 is no exception,” the astronomers noted.
NGC 4951 is also classified as a Seyfert galaxy, a type of galaxy that has a so-called active galactic nucleus.
“This image demonstrates well how energetic the galaxy is, and some of the dynamic galactic activity which transports matter and energy throughout it: a shining core surrounded by swirling arms, glowing pink star-forming regions, and thick dust,” the reseachers said.
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