The Whirlpool Galaxy (M51) (JohnEEvans)

Celestial hemisphere: Northern · Constellation: Canes Venatici (CVn) · Contains: IC 4263 · IC 4277 · M 51 · NGC 5194 · NGC 5195 · Whirlpool Galaxy

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The Whirlpool Galaxy (M51)

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The Whirlpool Galaxy (M51)

The Whirlpool Galaxy (M51) is a spiral galaxy in Canes Venatici. It is 31 million light-years from Earth.

M51 is about 43% of the size of the Milky Way and about 10% of its mass. There is a black hole at the centre of the galaxy.

The winding arms of the spiral galaxy are long lanes of stars, gas and dust. Such striking arms are a hallmark of so-called grand-design spiral galaxies. The arms are star factories, compressing hydrogen gas and creating clusters of new stars.

Some astronomers think that the Whirlpool’s arms are particularly prominent because of the effects of a close encounter with NGC 5195, the small, yellowish galaxy at the outermost tip of one of the arms. The small galaxy has been gliding past the Whirlpool for hundreds of millions of years, and is now behind it from our perspective.

In September 2020, the Chandra X-ray Observatory announced it had found the first candidate exoplanet outside our Milky Way in M51. It lies on the arm that appears to reach out towards NGC 5195 nearer to the centre of M51.

The smaller galaxy IC 4263 can also be seen at the bottom left of the picture.

Please note: The following tables are updated every 24 hours.

Distribution of astrophotographers

This table shows the number of distinct astrophotographers who have been assigned and IOTD/TP award compared to the total number of images awarded.
	Distinct awarded users	Total awarded images
Image of the day
Top picks
Top pick nominations

Distribution of subject types

This table shows the distribution of awards per subject type, compared to the popularity of images of that subject type.
	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Deep sky
Solar system
Extremely wide field
Star trails
Northern lights
Noctilucent clouds
Landscape

Distribution of data sources

This table shows the distribution of awards per data source, compared to the popularity of images acquired from that data source.
	Image of the day	Top pick	Top pick nominations	Total submitted
Backyard
Traveller
Own remote observatory
Amateur hosting facility
Public amaeteur data
Professional, scientific grade data
Mix of multiple sources
Other
Unknown

The “AstroBin Image of the Day and Top Picks”, or IOTD/TP, is a long-running system to promote beautiful, interesting, peculiar, or otherwise amazing astrophotographs, with a focus on technical excellence. Learn more.

Submitted The date and time when you submitted this image for IOTD/TP consideration.	...
Views by Submitters (available since September 19th, 2023) Every image is assigned to 50% of available Submitters. In the event that at least 80% of them don't view the image before its time in the IOTD/TP process expires, it's assigned to the other 50% of Submitters and the process begins anew.
Promotions by Submitters When 3 distinct Submitters promote the image, it moves on to the next stage of the process: evaluation for Top Pick status. This requirement, in addition to anonymization of images and distribution to only a subset of them, prevents biases and ensures that the best images are selected.
Promotions by Reviewers When 3 distinct Reviewers promote the image, it moves on to the next stage of the process: evaluation for IOTD status.
Early dismissal Staff members have a lot of images to inspect on a daily basis, and they can dismiss images if they believe they don't meet the requirements for IOTD/TP selection. If an image is dismissed 5 times, it's removed from the process. This streamlines the process and ensures that any bias present in promotions could be overruled by other staff members.

Status	Basic success
Started	...
Astrometry.net job	5499264
PixInsight job	n/a
PixInsight queue size	n/a
PixInsight stage	n/a

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Contribution Index (beta):

The Whirlpool Galaxy (M51)

The Whirlpool Galaxy (M51)

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Image Index:

Contribution Index (beta):

The Whirlpool Galaxy (M51)

The Whirlpool Galaxy (M51)

Equipment

Acquisition details

Description

Comments

Sky plot

Histogram

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