A face-on spiral galaxy hosting exploding stars

Spiral galaxy NGC 5468 is in a fortunate position from our perspective. It is face-on, giving astronomers on Earth a marvellous view of its intricate features: its bright core and twisting spiral arms, peppered with newborn stars glowing fiercely bright blue.

This galaxy is the source of numerous exploding stars – known as supernovae – many of which have been observed by astronomers over the past 20 years.

Despite its distance of 130 million lightyears from Earth, this galaxy hasn’t finished revealing its secrets.

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Observatory Hubble Space Telescope

Release date 2 December 2019

Image credit ESA/Hubble & NASA, A. Riess et al. / Acknowledgements: Judy Schmidt (Geckzilla)