Edge-On View of NGC 4013
The Hubble telescope has snapped this remarkable view of a perfectly 'edge-on' galaxy, NGC 4013. This new Hubble picture reveals with exquisite detail huge clouds of dust and gas extending along, as well as far above, the galaxy's main disk. NGC 4013 is a spiral galaxy, similar to our Milky Way, lying some 55 million light-years from Earth in the direction of the constellation Ursa Major.
Viewed face-on, it would look like a nearly circular pinwheel, but NGC 4013 happens to be seen edge-on from our vantage point. Even at 55 million light-years, the galaxy is larger than Hubble's field of view, and the image shows only a little more than half of the object, albeit with unprecedented detail.
Credit:
About the Image
NASA press release
NASA caption
NASA caption
| Id: | opo0107a |
| Type: | Observation |
| Release date: | 1 March 2001, 07:00 |
| Size: | 1041 x 1018 px |
About the Object
| Name: | IRAS 11559+4413, NGC 4013 |
| Type: | • Local Universe : Galaxy : Type : Spiral • Galaxies Images/Videos |
| Distance: | 60 million light years |
Colours & filters
| Band | Wavelength | Telescope |
| Optical B |
450 nm | Hubble Space Telescope WFPC2 |
| Optical V |
555 nm | Hubble Space Telescope WFPC2 |
| Infrared I |
814 nm | Hubble Space Telescope WFPC2 |
