NASA has released a stunning image taken by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope of the edge-on spiral galaxy NGC 5907.
This Hubble image shows the edge-on spiral galaxy NGC 5907. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / R. de Jong / Judy Schmidt, www.geckzilla.com.
NGC 5907 is located some 56 million light-years away in the northern constellation of Draco.
The galaxy was discovered on May 5, 1788 by the German-born British astronomer William Herschel.
Also known as LEDA 54470, UGC 9801, the Knife Edge Galaxy and the Splinter Galaxy, it has a diameter of 150,000 light-years.
NGC 5907 is probably a member of a group of galaxies called the NGC 5866 group.
“Appearing as an elongated line of stars and dark dust, the galaxy is categorized as a spiral galaxy just like our own Milky Way,” Hubble astronomers said.
“In this Hubble image, we don’t see the beautiful spiral arms because we are viewing it edge-on, like looking at the rim of a plate.”
“It is for this reason that NGC 5907 is also known as the Knife Edge Galaxy.”
“Although not visible in this image, ghostly streams of stars on large arching loops extend into space, circling around the galaxy,” the researchers added.
“They are believed to be remnants of a small dwarf galaxy, torn apart by NGC 5907 and merged with it over 4 billion years ago.”
In 2017, ESA’s XMM-Newton observatory spotted an extremely bright pulsar in NGC 5907.
