Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Canes Venatici (CVn)  ·  Contains:  M 106  ·  NGC 4248  ·  NGC 4258
Messier 106, Connor Matherne
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Messier 106, Connor Matherne
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Probably one of my favorite images to date. For some reason something was off between the red and blue channels leading to some magenta stars. Other than that though, I really enjoyed this data. Was blown away by the sharpness in the L channel after all the processing was said and done.

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Close to the Great Bear (Ursa Major) and surrounded by the stars of the Hunting Dogs (Canes Venatici), this celestial wonder was discovered in 1781 by the metric French astronomer Pierre Mechain. Later, it was added to the catalog of his friend and colleague Charles Messier as M106. Modern deep telescopic views reveal it to be an island universe -- a spiral galaxy around 30 thousand light-years across located only about 21 million light-years beyond the stars of the Milky Way. Along with a bright central core, this colorful composite image highlights youthful blue star clusters and reddish stellar nurseries tracing the galaxy's spiral arms. It also shows off remarkable reddish jets of glowing hydrogen gas. In addition to small companion galaxy NGC 4248 (bottom left) background galaxies can be found scattered throughout the frame. M106 (aka NGC 4258) is a nearby example of the Seyfert class of active galaxies, seen across the spectrum from radio to x-rays. Active galaxies are believed to be powered by matter falling into a massive central black hole.

Source: APOD

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    Messier 106, Connor Matherne
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    Messier 106, Connor Matherne
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Description: Closer view of M106

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Messier 106, Connor Matherne