Into My Arms
Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2014: Image Processing Workshop Participants obtained this image of spiral galaxy NGC 90 in October 2014 at the Mount Lemmon SkyCenter, Arizona. The galaxy lies about 250 million light years away in the constellation of Andromeda. NGC 90 is the galaxy with extended arms at the top center of the image.
— Tom Chao
Ring Crimson
Thursday, Oct. 30, 2014: Galaxy NGC 1291, in the constellation of Eridanus, gleams with a ring of young stars circling it. This ring, colored red here, contains new stars igniting and heating up dust that glows with infrared light. In contrast, the stars in the center of the galaxy glow with shorter-wavelength infrared light colored blue. These stars have lived longer, having already consumed fuel for new stars. The galaxy is about 12 billion years old, and is classed as a barred galaxy, having a bar of stars in its center. In young, gas-rich galaxies, stellar bars force gas toward the center, promoting star formation. Over time, as star-making fuel runs out, the central regions quiet down, and star-formation activity migrates to the galaxy’s outskirts. Read the Full Story.
— Tom Chao
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