File:Little Galaxy Explored.jpg
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| Description |
English: The infrared portrait of the Small Magellanic Cloud, taken by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, reveals the stars and dust in this galaxy as never seen before. The Small Magellanic Cloud is a nearby satellite galaxy to our Milky Way galaxy, approximately 200,000 light-years away.
The image shows the main body of the Small Magellanic Cloud, which is comprised of the "bar" on the left and a "wing" extending to the right. The bar contains both old stars (in blue) and young stars lighting up their natal dust (green/red). The wing mainly contains young stars. In addition, the image contains a galactic globular cluster in the lower left (blue cluster of stars) and emission from dust in our own galaxy (green in the upper right and lower right corners). The data in this image are being used by astronomers to study the lifecycle of dust in the entire galaxy: from the formation in stellar atmospheres, to the reservoir containing the present day interstellar medium, and the dust consumed in forming new stars. The dust being formed in old, evolved stars (blue stars with a red tinge) is measured using mid-infrared wavelengths. The present day interstellar dust is weighed by measuring the intensity and color of emission at longer infrared wavelengths. The rate at which the raw material is being consumed is determined by studying ionized gas regions and the younger stars (yellow/red extended regions). The Small Magellanic Cloud, and its companion galaxy the Large Magellanic Cloud, are the two galaxies where this type of study is possible, and the research could not be done without Spitzer. This image was captured by Spitzer's infrared array camera and multiband imaging photometer (blue is 3.6-micron light; green is 8.0 microns; and red is combination of 24-, 70- and 160-micron light). The blue color mainly traces old stars. The green color traces emission from organic dust grains (mainly polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons). The red traces emission from larger, cooler dust grains. The image was taken as part of the Spitzer Legacy program known as SAGE-SMC: Surveying the Agents of Galaxy Evolution in the Tidally-Stripped, Low Metallicity Small Magellanic Cloud. |
| Date | |
| Source | http://www.spitzer.caltech.edu/images/2872-ssc2010-02a-Little-Galaxy-Explored |
| Author | NASA/JPL-Caltech/K. Gordon (STScI) |
Image use policy: http://www.spitzer.caltech.edu/info/18-Image-Use-Policy
Licensing edit
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This file is in the public domain in the United States because it was solely created by NASA. NASA copyright policy states that "NASA material is not protected by copyright unless noted". (See Template:PD-USGov, NASA copyright policy page or JPL Image Use Policy.) |  |
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| Date/Time | Thumbnail | Dimensions | User | Comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| current | 23:34, 13 April 2016 | | 7,801 × 7,021 (22.43 MB) | Lithopsian (talk | contribs) | Rotate 180 degrees, which works better in the only Wikipedia article currently linking this image. North is now up. |
| 21:42, 13 April 2016 |  | 7,801 × 7,021 (41.08 MB) | Lithopsian (talk | contribs) | Higher resolution unframed version of the image | |
| 20:28, 13 June 2011 |  | 2,400 × 3,000 (8.89 MB) | Spitzersteph (talk | contribs) |
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