images

Galaxy NGC 134 in Sculptor

by

ESO/Novapix

Reference

a-gax01-34001

Date

2008-07-20

NGC 134 is a barred spiral with its spiral arms loosely wrapped around a bright, bar-shaped central region. The red features lounging along its spiral arms are glowing clouds of hot gas in which stars are forming, so-called HII regions. The galaxy also shows prominent dark lanes of dust across the disc, obscuring part of the galaxy's starlight. The image is a colour composite based on data obtained with the FORS2 instrument attached to Antu, UT1 of the VLT. NGC 134 is located in the southern constellation Sculptor, about 60 million light-years away from Earth. When the light that was captured by ESO's Very Large Telescope (VLT) originally left the galaxy, a dramatic episode of mass extinction had led to the disappearance of dinosaurs on Earth.