A sparkling galactic neighbour

Esahubble_potw2334a_1024

esahubble_potw2334a August 21st, 2023

Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, R. Tully

The galaxy ESO 300-16 looms over this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. This galaxy, which lies 28.7 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Eridanus, is a ghostly assemblage of stars which resembles a sparkling cloud. A rogue’s gallery of distant galaxies and foreground stars complete this astronomical portrait, which was captured by the Advanced Camera for Surveys.  This observation is one of a series which aims to get to know our galactic neighbours; around three quarters of the known galaxies suspected to lie within 10 megaparsecs of Earth have been observed by Hubble in enough detail to resolve their brightest stars and establish the distances to these galaxies. A team of astronomers proposed using small gaps in Hubble’s observing schedule to acquaint ourselves with the remaining quarter of the nearby galaxies. The megaparsec — meaning one million parsecs — is a unit used by astronomers to chart the mind-bogglingly large distances involved in astronomy. The motion of Earth around the Sun means that stars appear to slightly shift against very distant stars over the course of a year. This small shift is referred to as parallax and is measured in angular units: degrees, minutes, and seconds. One parsec is equivalent to saying a parallax of one-arcsecond, and is equivalent to 3.26 light-years or 30.9 trillion kilometres. The closest exoplanet to the Sun is Proxima Centauri b, which lies 1.3 parsecs away. [Image Description: An irregular galaxy that resembles the shape of a cloud. It is made of many tiny stars all clumped together, surrounded in a diffuse light. In the central, brightest part there is a bubble of blue gas. The galaxy is surrounded by mostly very small and faint objects, though there are bright stars above and to the left of it, and a string of galaxies nearby.]

Provider: Hubble Space Telescope | ESA

Image Source: https://esahubble.org/images/potw2334a/

Curator: ESA/Hubble, Baltimore, MD, United States

Image Use Policy: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

Image Details

Image Type
Observation
Object Name
ESO 300-16
Esahubble_potw2334a_128
 

Position Details

Position (ICRS)
RA = 3h 10m 9.0s
DEC = -40° 0’ 14.3”
Orientation
North is 92.4° CCW
Field of View
2.7 x 2.0 arcminutes
Constellation
Eridanus

Color Mapping

  Telescope Spectral Band Wavelength
Blue Hubble (ACS) Optical (V) 606.0 nm
Green Hubble (ACS) Optical (V) 606.0 nm
Green Hubble (ACS) Optical (I) 814.0 nm
Red Hubble (ACS) Optical (I) 814.0 nm
Spectrum_base
Blue
Green
Green
Red
Esahubble_potw2334a_1280
×
ID
potw2334a
Subject Category
Subject Name
ESO 300-16
Credits
ESA/Hubble & NASA, R. Tully
Release Date
2023-08-21T06:00:00
Lightyears
Redshift
Reference Url
https://esahubble.org/images/potw2334a/
Type
Observation
Image Quality
Distance Notes
Facility
Hubble Space Telescope, Hubble Space Telescope, Hubble Space Telescope, Hubble Space Telescope
Instrument
ACS, ACS, ACS, ACS
Color Assignment
Blue, Green, Green, Red
Band
Optical, Optical, Optical, Optical
Bandpass
V, V, I, I
Central Wavelength
606, 606, 814, 814
Start Time
Integration Time
Dataset ID
None, None, None, None
Notes
Coordinate Frame
ICRS
Equinox
J2000
Reference Value
47.53730096876207, -40.00396019331982
Reference Dimension
4129.0, 3014.0
Reference Pixel
2064.5, 1507.0
Scale
-1.1091707317971127e-05, 1.1091707317971127e-05
Rotation
92.420000000000044
Coordinate System Projection:
TAN
Quality
Full
FITS Header
Notes
Creator (Curator)
ESA/Hubble
URL
https://esahubble.org
Name
Email
Telephone
Address
ESA Office, Space Telescope Science Institute, 3700 San Martin Dr
City
Baltimore
State/Province
MD
Postal Code
21218
Country
United States
Rights
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
Publisher
ESA/Hubble
Publisher ID
esahubble
Resource ID
potw2334a
Metadata Date
2023-08-07T13:48:24+02:00
Metadata Version
1.1
×

 

Detailed color mapping information coming soon...

×

There is no distance meta data in this image.

 

Providers | Sign In