A (Galactic) Arm’s Length Away
noirlab_iotw2019a May 6th, 2020
Credit: KPNO/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA Acknowledgments: PI: M T. Patterson (New Mexico State University) Image processing: Travis Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage), Mahdi Zamani & Davide de Martin
The two galaxies in this image — NGC 672 (top right) and IC 1727 (bottom left) — appear to be so close that they are almost elbowing each other, like playful children. In fact, the galaxies shown in this beautifully detailed image taken at the Kitt Peak National Observatory, a program of NSF NOIRLab, are classified as a galactic pair, and the gravity of each galaxy influences the other. The pair are located around 20 million light-years away from Earth and the space between them spans over 80,000 light-years, a seemingly enormous gap. However, from the perspective of the galaxies themselves, that separation is not so significant, as it is roughly equivalent to the size of the galaxies themselves.
Provider: NOIRLab
Image Source: https://noirlab.edu/public/images/iotw2019a/
Curator: NSF's NOIRLab, Tucson, AZ, USA
Image Use Policy: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
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Image Details
Position Details
Color Mapping
- ID
- iotw2019a
- Subject Category
- Subject Name
- IC 1727, NGC 6720
- Credits
- KPNO/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA Acknowledgments: PI: M T. Patterson (New Mexico State University) Image processing: Travis Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage), Mahdi Zamani & Davide de Martin
- Release Date
- 2020-05-06T03:00:00
- Lightyears
- Redshift
- Reference Url
- https://noirlab.edu/public/images/iotw2019a/
- Type
- Observation
- Image Quality
- Distance Notes
- Facility
- Nicholas U. Mayall 4-meter Telescope, Nicholas U. Mayall 4-meter Telescope, Nicholas U. Mayall 4-meter Telescope, Nicholas U. Mayall 4-meter Telescope
- Instrument
- Mosaic I, Mosaic I, Mosaic I, Mosaic I
- Color Assignment
- Red, Orange, Cyan, Blue
- Band
- Optical, Optical, Optical, Optical
- Bandpass
- H-alpha, R, B, U
- Central Wavelength
- 657, 651, 438, 355
- Start Time
- Integration Time
- Dataset ID
- None, None, None, None
- Notes
- Coordinate Frame
- ICRS
- Equinox
- J2000
- Reference Value
- 26.9258554333, 27.3719207928
- Reference Dimension
- 3619.0, 3414.0
- Reference Pixel
- 1809.5, 1707.0
- Scale
- -7.26389067102e-05, 7.26389067102e-05
- Rotation
- -90.1
- Coordinate System Projection:
- TAN
- Quality
- Full
- FITS Header
- Notes
- Creator (Curator)
- NSF's NOIRLab
- URL
- https://noirlab.edu
- Name
- Telephone
- Address
- 950 North Cherry Ave.
- City
- Tucson
- State/Province
- AZ
- Postal Code
- 85719
- Country
- USA
- Rights
- Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
- Publisher
- NSF's NOIRLab
- Publisher ID
- noirlab
- Resource ID
- iotw2019a
- Resource URL
- http://noirlab.edu/public/media/archives/images/original/iotw2019a.tif
- Related Resources
- Metadata Date
- 2020-04-18T02:50:06+02:00
- Metadata Version
- 1.1
Detailed color mapping information coming soon...
