南方风车
(原标题: M83: The Southern Pinwheel)
2025-01-16
浏览次数: 17
美丽明亮的螺旋星系M83位于1200万光年之外，靠近长蛇座的东南端。由暗尘带和蓝色星团描绘的突出旋臂使这个星系有了一个流行的名字，南方风车。尽管如此，点缀在这个宇宙风车旋臂上的红色恒星形成区域还是让人想到了另一个绰号——千红宝石星系。M83直径仅4万光年，比银河系还小，是包括活动星系半人马座A在内的星系群中的一员。事实上，M83的核心本身在x射线能量下是明亮的，显示出中子星和黑洞的高度集中，这些中子星和黑洞是恒星形成的强烈爆发所留下的。这张清晰的彩色图像还展示了前景中尖锐的银河系恒星和遥远的背景星系。图像数据是由Cerro Tololo美洲天文台的暗能量相机和布兰科4米望远镜拍摄的。
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Beautiful and bright spiral galaxy M83 lies a some twelve million light-years away, near the southeastern tip of the very long constellation Hydra. Prominent spiral arms traced by dark dust lanes and blue star clusters lend this galaxy its popular name, The Southern Pinwheel. Still, reddish star forming regions that dot this cosmic pinwheel's spiral arms have suggested another nickname, the Thousand-Ruby Galaxy. A mere 40,000 light-years across, smaller than the Milky Way, M83 is a member of a group of galaxies that includes active galaxy Centaurus A. In fact, the core of M83 itself is bright at x-ray energies, showing a high concentration of neutron stars and black holes left from an intense burst of star formation. This sharp color image also features spiky foreground Milky Way stars and distant background galaxies. The image data was captured with the Dark Energy Camera and Blanco 4-meter telescope at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory.