NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day Collection

M81 and M82: GALEX Full Field

Intriguing galaxy pair M81 and M82 shine in this full-field view [ http://www.galex.ca…imagegallery.html#GA L ] from the orbiting GALEX observatory. GALEX - the Galaxy Evolution Explorer [ http://www.galex.ca…] - scans the cosmos in ultraviolet light [ http://imagers.gsfc…], a view that follows star formation and galaxy evolution [ http://www.stsci.ed…] through the Universe [ http://www.jpl.nasa…news.cfm?release=200 4-294 ]. Near the bottom, magnificent spiral galaxy M81 [ http://antwrp.gsfc.…], similar in size to our own Milky Way, shows off young stars in winding spiral arms. Less than 100 million years old, the young stars are blue in the false-color GALEX image and seen to be well separated from the older yellowish stars of the galactic core. But near the top, turbulent, irregular galaxy M82 [ http://www.seds.org…] shows the results of extreme rates of star birth and death. Supernovae, the death explosions of massive stars, contribute to a violent wind of material expelled from M82's central [ http://antwrp.gsfc.…] regions. The striking [ http://antwrp.gsfc.…] irregular and spiral galaxy pair are located only about 10 million light-years away in the northern constellation Ursa Major [ http://www.windows.…Constellations/circu mpolar/ursa_major.ht ml ].

GALEX Team [ http://www.galex.ca…investigators.html ], Caltech [ http://www.galex.ca…], NASA [ http://www.nasa.gov…]

M81

M82

Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC)

Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL)

Explorer

Ursa Major

GALEX

http://antwrp.gsfc.…

SPD-APOD-ap041230