Celestial hemisphere:  Northern  ·  Constellation: Canes Venatici (CVn)  ·  Contains:  M 63  ·  NGC 5055  ·  Sunflower Galaxy
M 63 - The Sunflower Galaxy, James E.
Powered byPixInsight

M 63 - The Sunflower Galaxy

M 63 - The Sunflower Galaxy, James E.
Powered byPixInsight

M 63 - The Sunflower Galaxy

Equipment

Loading...

Acquisition details

Loading...

Description

M63, the Sunflower Galaxy, is a spiral galaxy in the constellation Canes Venatici. It is nearly 100,000 light years across and is about 25 light years from Earth. It has a bright yellowish core, sweeping blue spiral arms with many dust lanes and dotted with pink star forming regions. Due to the lack of large scale continuous spiral structure (in near infrared, a two-arm structure is observed) it is considered a flocculent galaxy. In deeper exposures, there are faint loops and extensions of the galaxy’s spiral arms which could be the result of gravitational attractions with nearby galaxies.

Credit: APOD June 6, 2019

A deeper view of M63 with tidal streams is here:  https://astrob.in/ws7khb/0/

Comments