Messier 66 -

Messier 66

David Malin has obtained this beautiful image of M 66 with the 3.9-meter

Anglo Australian Telescope. It is a composite of three images, taken with

different emulsions and filters, thus sensitive for light of different colors,

exposed as follows: Blue and Red: 27 minutes, Green: 22 minutes.

Messier 66 exhibits a remarkable central bulge. This galaxy shows several

anomalies, deviations from “perfect” spiral structure, which can be observed in

many galaxies, notably a crack in one of its spiral arms at the lower end of the

bright central region and a wave-away of the spiral arm visible rightest in this

image. This is very probably a result of its gravitational interactions with its

neighbors M65 and

This images is copyrighted and may be used for private purpose

only. For any other kind of use, including internet mirroring and storing on

CD-ROM, please contact