Behold NGC 1566 – also known as ‘The Spanish Dancer Spiral Galaxy’. To wit:
An island universe containing billions of stars and situated about 40 million light-years away toward the constellation of the Dolphinfish (Dorado), NGC 1566 presents a gorgeous face-on view. Classified as a grand design spiral, NGC 1566’s shows two prominent and graceful spiral arms that are traced by bright blue star clusters and dark cosmic dust lanes. Numerous Hubble Space Telescope images of NGC 1566 have been taken to study star formation, supernovas, and the spiral’s unusually active centre. Some of these images, stored online in the Hubble Legacy Archive, were freely downloaded, combined, and digitally processed by an industrious amateur to create the featured image. NGC 1566’s flaring centre makes the spiral one of the closest and brightest Seyfert galaxies, likely housing a central supermassive black hole wreaking havoc on surrounding stars and gas.
Full sized image here.
(Image: NASA, ESA, Hubble: Leo Shatz)
Thankyou.
I’m sure you featured this recently. No harm, a post worth another orbit.
No Hoop, this is the first time we’ve had the Spanish Dancer. Perhaps you’re thinking of Messier 96?
https://www.broadsheet.ie/2019/06/14/mmm-spirally-3/
Ah I see, sorry Chomps. Always getting my Messiers and my Dancers mixed up.