Hubble spies Pinwheel galaxy in pin-sharp detail
 

Galactic gallery released


Images released today from the Hubble Space Telescope show the gigantic Pinwheel galaxy in unprecedented detail. Regions where stars are born are clearly visible in the set.

The spectacular super-high definition main portrait (pictured right) is actually a composite of 51 individual exposures.
The Pinwheel sits face-on 25m light years away in the constellation Ursa Major, and contains at least a trillion stars, and 100 billion which are probably similar to our sun in heat and lifespan. At 170,000 light-years across, the spiral is about twice the diameter of the Milky Way.

The full set of images can be found here.

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