The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has provided an unparalleled snapshot of the irregular galaxy NGC 2814.
This Hubble image shows NGC 2814, an irregular galaxy about 85 million light-years away in the constellation Ursa Major. Image credit: NASA/ESA/Hubble/C. Kilpatrick.
NGC 2814 It is located approximately 85 million light years from Earth in the constellation Ursa Major.
Also known as IRAS 09170+6428, LEDA 26469 or UGC 4952, this galaxy was discovered by the German-British astronomer William Herschel on April 3, 1791
“NGC 2814 has three close galactic neighbors: a sideways spiral galaxy known as NGC 2820; an irregular galaxy called IC 2458; and an unbarred spiral galaxy called NGC 2805,” the Hubble astronomers said.
“Together, the four galaxies form a galaxy group known as Holmberg 124.”
“In some literature, these galaxies are called a group of ‘late-type galaxies,'” they added.
“The terminology ‘late type’ refers to spiral and irregular galaxies, while ‘early type’ refers to elliptical galaxies.”
“This rather confusing terminology has led to a common misconception within the astronomical community.”
“It is still widely believed that Edwin Hubble mistakenly thought that elliptical galaxies were the evolutionary precursors of spiral and irregular galaxies, and that this is the reason why ellipticals are classified as ‘early type’ and spirals and irregulars are classified as classified as ‘late’. -guy’.”
“This misconception is due to Hubble’s galactic classification ‘tuning fork’, which visually displays galaxy types ranging from ellipticals to spirals, in a sequence that could easily be interpreted as a temporal evolution.”
“However, Hubble actually adopted the terms ‘early type’ and ‘late type’ from much older astronomical terminology for stellar classifications, and did not want to claim that ellipticals were literally evolutionary precursors to spiral and irregular galaxies.”
“In fact, he explicitly said in his 1927 article that ‘the nomenclature… (early and late)… refers to position in the sequence, and temporal connotations are made at your own risk.'”
“Although Hubble himself was quite emphatic on this issue, the misunderstanding persists almost a hundred years later, and perhaps provides an instructive example of why it is useful to classify things with easy-to-interpret terminology from the beginning.”
The new color image of NGC 2814 is composed of observations from Hubble’s advanced camera for surveys (ACS) in the optical and near-infrared parts of the spectrum.
Two filters were used to sample various wavelengths. Color results from assigning different tones to each monochrome image associated with an individual filter.
