Poster Version
NASA's Galaxy Evolution Explorer Mission celebrates its sixth anniversary
studying galaxies beyond our Milky Way through its sensitive ultraviolet
telescope, the only such far-ultraviolet detector in space.
The mission studies the shape, brightness, size and distance of distant
galaxies across 10 billion years of cosmic history, giving scientists a
wealth of data to help us better understand the origins of the universe.
One such object is pictured here, the galaxy NGC598, more commonly known
as M33.
This image is a blend of the Galaxy Evolution Explorer's M33 image and
another taken by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. M33, one of our closest
galactic neighbors, is about 2.9 million light-years away in the
constellation Triangulum, part of what's known as our Local Group of
galaxies.
Together, the Galaxy Evolution Explorer and Spitzer can see a broad
spectrum of sky. Spitzer, for example, can detect mid-infrared radiation
from dust that has absorbed young stars' ultraviolet light. That's
something the Galaxy Evolution Explorer cannot see. This combined image
shows in amazing detail the beautiful and complicated interlacing of the
heated dust and young stars. In some regions of M33, dust gathers where
there is very little far-ultraviolet light, suggesting that the young
stars are obscured or that stars further away are heating the dust. In
some of the outer regions of the galaxy, just the opposite is true: There
are plenty of young stars and very little dust.
Far-ultraviolet light from young stars glimmers blue, near-ultraviolet
light from intermediate age stars glows green, near-infrared light from
old stars burns yellow and orange, and dust rich in organic molecules
burns red. The small blue flecks outside the spiral disk of M33 are most
likely distant background galaxies. This image is a four-band composite
that, in addition to the two ultraviolet bands, includes near infrared as
yellow/orange and far infrared as red.
The California Institute of Technology, in Pasadena, Calif., leads the
Galaxy Evolution Explorer mission and is responsible for science
operations and data analysis. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, also in
Pasadena, manages the mission and built the science instrument. The
mission was developed under NASA's Explorers Program managed by the
Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. South Korea and France are the
mission's international partners.
For information about the Galaxy Evolution Explorer, go to: http://www.galex.caltech.edu.