Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Ursa Major (UMa)  ·  Contains:  HD122865  ·  M 101  ·  NGC 5447  ·  NGC 5449  ·  NGC 5450  ·  NGC 5451  ·  NGC 5453  ·  NGC 5455  ·  NGC 5457  ·  NGC 5461  ·  NGC 5462  ·  NGC 5471  ·  Pinwheel galaxy
Getting plate-solving status, please wait...
M 101, NGC 5457, The Pinwheel Galaxy, rdhand
Powered byPixInsight

M 101, NGC 5457, The Pinwheel Galaxy

Getting plate-solving status, please wait...
M 101, NGC 5457, The Pinwheel Galaxy, rdhand
Powered byPixInsight

M 101, NGC 5457, The Pinwheel Galaxy

Equipment

Loading...

Acquisition details

Loading...

Description

The Pinwheel Galaxy (also known as NGC 5457 or Messier 101) is a face-on spiral galaxy 21 million light-years from Earth.  It is a large galaxy with a diameter of 170,000 light-years and it contains around a trillion stars.  The galaxy’s spiral arms are sprinkled with large regions of star-forming nebulas. These nebulas are areas of intense star formation within giant molecular hydrogen clouds.  It is asymmetrical due to the tidal forces from interactions with its companion galaxies.

Comments

Revisions

  • M 101, NGC 5457, The Pinwheel Galaxy, rdhand
    Original
  • Final
    M 101, NGC 5457, The Pinwheel Galaxy, rdhand
    B

Sky plot

Sky plot

Histogram

M 101, NGC 5457, The Pinwheel Galaxy, rdhand

In these public groups

Cloudy Nights

In these collections

Galaxy
Messier