Above and Beyond: Spiral Galaxy NGC 6217

 

 

Produced by the Space Telescope Science Institute’s Office of Public Outreach.

 

All images, illustrations, and videos courtesy of NASA, ESA, and STScI except:

 

·       NGC 6822 image courtesy of the Local Group Galaxies Survey Team/NOAO/AURA/NSF

·       Taurus constellation drawing from Firmamentum Sobiescianum sive Uranographia by Johannes Hevelius, courtesy of the United States Naval Observatory

·       NGC 4565 image courtesy of the European Southern Observatory

·       Small Magellanic Cloud image courtesy of F. Winkler/Middlebury College, the MCELS Team, and NOAO/AURA/NSF

 

Written by Vanessa Thomas

Designed by John Godfrey 

Music courtesy of Association Production Music

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A yellow, orange, pink, and white spiral galaxy.

 

Text, GALAXY N.G.C. 6217. This spiral galaxy is packed full of stars. Bright blue stars and clusters of stars swirl around the center of the galaxy along a coiled set of scaffolding known as spiral arms.

 

A swarm of yellow stars crowds into the center of the galaxy, forming a dense, bright core.

 

But this galaxy contains a lot more than just stars.

 

Broad veins of brown dust stretch along the starry spiral arms.

 

Pinkish clouds of gas, called nebulae, also pepper the arms.

 

At the hub of the whole thing, lurking within the galaxy's intense core, lies a massive beast that cannot be seen -- a supermassive black hole.