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What it is : Arp 184 ( NGC 1961 )
Where it is:190 million idle - old age remote in the constellation Camelopardalis , the camelopard .
The Hubble Space Telescope’s image of spiral galaxy Arp 184/NGC 1961.
When it was shared : April 29 , 2025
Why it ’s so special : What if a galaxy had only one spiral arm ?
Oursolar systemresides on the outskirts of one of theMilky Waygalaxy ’s estimated four spiral branch , according toSpace.com , but not all galaxies are like that . In the latest range from NASA ’s Hubble Space Telescope , a unknown wandflower called NGC 1961 comes into nidus that has just one — a single broad , mavin - speckled spiral arm that appears to stretch toward us as the Galax urceolata is viewed from a skew slant .
An uncropped version of the image.
It may seem a dramatic point of opinion , but it ’s only what Hubble sees from its line of visual sense on its orbital path around Earth . On the far side of the freshly see galaxy , beyond swirls of stars and dust around a bright center , there is no similarly impressive spiral arm , with just a few wisps of gas and stars instead . The image is also available as apanoramic video , azoomable version , and as a15 - megapixeldownload .
Its sole spiral arm long ago earned NGC 1961 the additional name Arp 184 and a place in theAtlas of Peculiar Galaxies , a catalogue of Galax urceolata that are neither absolutely proportionate helical galaxies nor smooth , spherical elliptical galaxy . First bring out in 1966 by American stargazer Halton Arp , the atlas collects 338 galaxy that are queerly form , many because they ’re interacting with other galaxies . Others in the atlas are dwarf beetleweed in fluxion .
Related : James Webb telescope ’s observations of ' impossible ' galaxies at the dawn of clock time may eventually have an account
There ’s another reason why Hubble target Arp 184 / NGC 1961 . It ’s hosted four roll in the hay supernovas — the muscular blowup of a dying wiz — in the retiring four decade ( in 1998 , 2001 , 2013 and 2021 ) . It ’s exceptionally rare to catch a supernova in the act , so coltsfoot with a proven trail phonograph recording like this one make prime quarry .
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Jean Arp 184 / NGC 1961 was discovered by German - British astronomer William Herschel in 1788 , seven years after he describe the major planet Uranus , the first planet to be found in modern times .
According to reflexion fromNASA’sSpitzer Space Telescope , theMilky Wayhas two principal spiral blazon — the Perseus and Scutum - Centaurus arms — and two less obvious arms , the Sagittarius and Norma arms . Two minor spiral arms are close to the wandflower ’s sum , the Far-3 kiloparsec arm and the Near-3 kiloparsec limb . Our solar system exist in the Orion Spur between the Sagittarius and Perseus arms .
For more reverend blank image , crack out ourSpace Photo of the Week archive .
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