Credit: ESA/Herschel/PACS/SPIRE/J.Fritz, U.Gent; X-ray: ESA/XMM Newton/EPIC/W. Pietsch, MPE

This image of the Andromeda spiral galaxy highlights explosive stars in its interior, and cooler, dusty stars forming in its many rings. The image is of an observation from the Herschel Space Observatory taken in infrared light. NASA plays a role in both of these European Space Agency-led missions.

Herschel provides a detailed look at the cool clouds of star birth that line the galaxy's five concentric rings. Massive young stars are heating blankets of dust that surround them, causing them to glow in the longer-wavelength infrared light, known as far-infrared, that Herschel sees.

Andromeda is our Milky Way galaxy's nearest large neighbor. It is located about 2.5 million light-years away and holds up to an estimated trillion stars. Our Milky Way is thought to contain about 200 billion to 400 billion stars.

Provider: Herschel Space Observatory

Image Source: https://www.herschel.caltech.edu/image/nhsc2011-001b

Curator: NASA Herschel Science Center, Pasadena, CA, USA

Image Use Policy: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/imagepolicy/