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NGC 4013: A Galaxy on the Edge

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.

-- Uncle Bob (unclb0b@aol.com), April 24, 2001

Answers

So this galaxy is--

(186000 miles/sec)(55000000 years)(3600sec/hr)(24x365hr/year)=

22613280000000000000.0 miles away and the galaxy that Hubble "sees" is 55million years old? Wow.

-- Lars (larsguy@yahoo.com), April 24, 2001.

Lars, I'm sure you meant to say that the galaxy is shown as it appeared 55 million years ago, because that's when the light that hit the Hubble left the galaxy in question. The Hubble is really one heluva time machine, when you think about it.

-- Just (Just@wandering.by), April 24, 2001.

and we are the only life in the universe?

-- Uncle Bob (unclb0b@aol.com), April 24, 2001.

Only life? Not hardly likely. There's bound to be a wide variety of self-reproductive scum and slime in the universe. The big question in my mind is whether homo sapiens sapiens will be alive or extinct a million years hence. Odds are, we won't be around that long.

-- Little Nipper (canis@minor.net), April 24, 2001.

Thanks, Uncle Bob. Awesome.

Lars, I think there needs to be a "3" in front of your "miles away" figure. And next time would you do us the favor of inserting commas or converting to scientific notation. 8^)

-- David L (bumpkin@dnet.net), April 24, 2001.

I forgot to comment about the very bright star appearing in the upper left of the photo. Though the star is obviously much closer to Hubble than to the galaxy being photographed, it happened to be positioned as if to be emerging from the "crack" in the galaxy. If this artistic composition was deliberate, a tip of the hat to the Hubble operator(s).

-- David L (bumpkin@dnet.net), April 24, 2001.

David--

Right. 3.2261328x10^20 miles. Sort of puts Mr Rodgers' neighborhood in perspective.

-- Lars (larsguy@yahoo.com), April 26, 2001.