Astronomy Picture of the Day [1]Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2021 January 28 [2]See Explanation. Clicking on the picture will download the highest resolution version available. Messier 66 Close Up Image Credit: [3]NASA, [4]ESA, [5]Hubble; Processing & Copyright: [6]Leo Shatz Explanation: Big, beautiful [7]spiral galaxy Messier 66 lies a mere [8]35 million light-years away. The gorgeous island universe is about 100 thousand light-years across, similar in size to the Milky Way. [9]This reprocessed [10]Hubble Space Telescope close-up view spans a region about 30,000 light-years wide around the galactic core. It shows the galaxy's disk dramatically inclined to our line-of-sight. Surrounding its bright core, the likely home of a supermassive black hole, obscuring dust lanes and young, blue star clusters sweep [11]along spiral arms dotted with the tell-tale glow of pinksh star forming regions. Messier 66, also known as NGC 3627, is the brightest of the three galaxies in the gravitationaly interacting [12]Leo Triplet. Tomorrow's picture: North America from North America __________________________________________________________________ [13]< | [14]Archive | [15]Submissions | [16]Index | [17]Search | [18]Calendar | [19]RSS | [20]Education | [21]About APOD | [22]Discuss | [23]> __________________________________________________________________ Authors & editors: [24]Robert Nemiroff ([25]MTU) & [26]Jerry Bonnell ([27]UMCP) NASA Official: Phillip Newman [28]Specific rights apply. [29]NASA Web Privacy Policy and Important Notices A service of: [30]ASD at [31]NASA / [32]GSFC & [33]Michigan Tech. U. References 1. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/archivepix.html 2. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/image/2101/M66_Hubble_LeoShatz_Crop.jpg 3. http://www.nasa.gov/ 4. http://www.esa.int/ 5. https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/hubble/story/index.html 6. https://www.astrobin.com/users/spinlock/ 7. ://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2017/messier-66 8. https://esahubble.org/images/heic1006a/ 9. https://www.astrobin.com/qzaary/B/?nc=user 10. https://www.nasa.gov/connect/ebooks/not-yet-imagined.html 11. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap100413.html 12. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap190418.html 13. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap210127.html 14. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/archivepix.html 15. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/apsubmit2015.html 16. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/aptree.html 17. https://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/apod/apod_search 18. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/calendar/allyears.html 19. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod.rss 20. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/edlinks.html 21. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/about_apod.html 22. http://asterisk.apod.com/discuss_apod.php?date=210128 23. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap210129.html 24. http://www.phy.mtu.edu/faculty/Nemiroff.html 25. http://www.phy.mtu.edu/ 26. https://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/htmltest/jbonnell/www/bonnell.html 27. http://www.astro.umd.edu/ 28. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/about_apod.html#srapply 29. https://www.nasa.gov/about/highlights/HP_Privacy.html 30. https://astrophysics.gsfc.nasa.gov/ 31. https://www.nasa.gov/ 32. https://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/ 33. http://www.mtu.edu/