✦ Today's cosmos
Thousands of Coma Cluster Galaxies
NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day · September 17, 1995
Tap the image for full resolution ↗
Image credit & copyright: Royal
Observatory Edinburgh, Anglo-Australian Observatory, and AURA
Explanation:
Almost every object in the above photograph is a
galaxy. The Coma Cluster of galaxies pictured
is a dense cluster containing many thousands of
galaxies. Many of these
galaxies contain as many stars as our own
Milky Way Galaxy. Although nearby
when compared to most other clusters, light from the Coma Cluster
still takes hundreds of millions of years to reach us. In
fact, the Coma Cluster is so big it takes light millions of years just to
go from one side to the other! This picture was created at the WWW site
Skyview, a "virtual
observatory" where it is possible to view any part of
the sky in wavelengths from radio to gamma-ray.
Tomorrow's picture: The Large Cloud of Magellan
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Astronomy Picture of the Day (TM) is created and copyrighted in 1995 by
Robert
Nemiroff and
Jerry
Bonnell who are solely responsible for its content. · via NASA APOD
◆ What you're looking at
Almost every object in the above photograph is a galaxy. The Coma Cluster of galaxies pictured is a dense cluster containing many thousands of galaxies. Many of these galaxies contain as many stars as our own Milky Way Galaxy. Although nearby when compared to most other clusters, light from the Coma Cluster still takes hundreds of millions of years to reach us. In fact, the Coma Cluster is so big it takes light millions of years just to go from one side to the other! This picture was created at the WWW site Skyview, a "virtual observatory" where it is possible to view any part of the sky in wavelengths from radio to gamma-ray.