M 100 Spiral Galaxy

About this Image

M100 is a classical face-on galaxy, it is showing very well defined spiral arms and displays a very dynamic appearance, appealing by the red and blue knots tracing the arms. The red knots are apparently diffuse gaseous nebulae in which star formation is just taking place, and which are excited to shine by its very hot young stars. The blue regions represent young stellar populations.
Dark dust lanes follow the spiral structure throughout the disk, and may be traced well into the central region to the nucleus.
It shows a similar appearance as the southern galaxy M 83..

The distance to this galaxy measures 60 million light years.
The brighter background galaxies from 12h clockwise are NGC 4328, NGC 4323, PGC 40045, IC 783 situated in a distance of several hundred million light years.
North is to the right.

Compare an ESO image of this galaxy: here.

Bekow you see a crop on the center of the above image in 50/100% size.