                  APOD: 2018 February 7 - NGC 7331 Close Up

                         Astronomy Picture of the Day

    Discover the cosmos! [1] Each day a different image or photograph of our
 fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a
                           professional astronomer.

                                2018 February 7
                                      [2]
                              NGC 7331 Close-Up
    Image Credit & License [3] : ESA/Hubble & NASA/D. Milisavljevic (Purdue
                                  University)

Explanation: Big, beautiful spiral galaxy NGC 7331 [4] is often touted as an
analog to our own Milky Way [5] . About 50 million light-years distant in the
northern constellation Pegasus [6] , NGC 7331 was recognized early on as a
spiral nebula [7]  and is actually one of the brighter galaxies not included
in Charles Messier's famous [8] 18th century catalog. Since the galaxy's disk
is inclined [9]  to our line-of-sight, long telescopic exposures often result
in an image that evokes a strong sense of depth. In this Hubble Space
Telescope close-up [10] , the galaxy's magnificent spiral arms feature dark
obscuring dust lanes, bright bluish clusters of massive young stars, and the
telltale reddish glow of active star forming regions. The bright yellowish
central regions harbor populations of older, cooler stars. Like the Milky Way
[11] , a supermassive black hole lies at the core of of spiral galaxy NGC
7331.

                   Tomorrow's picture: pixels in space [12]

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