Cetus
Duo M77 and NGC 1055
From
NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
At
the top right, large spiral galaxy NGC 1055 joins spiral Messier 77 in this sharp cosmic view toward the aquatic constellation
Cetus.
The
narrowed, dusty appearance of edge-on spiral NGC
1055 contrasts nicely with the face-on view of M77's
bright nucleus and spiral arms.
Both
over 100,000 light-years across, the pair are dominant members of a small
galaxy group about 60 million light-years away.
At
that estimated distance, M77 is one of the most remote objects in Charles Messier's catalog and is separated
from fellow island universe NGC 1055 by at least 500,000 light-years.
The
field of view is about the size of the full Moon on the
sky and includes colorful foreground Milky Way stars (with
diffraction spikes) along with more distant background
galaxies.
