More M106 -

The bright spiral galaxy M106 (NGC 4258) in Ursa Major. This system

is distinguished by “anomalous arms”, better described perhaps as jets,

seen curving outward through the disk in radio emission and optical

emission lines. Recent measurements of maser regions near the nucleus

suggest a supermassive dark object (a black hole candidate with mass of

order 100 million solar masses)

at the center of this galaxy. This pseudocolor rendition was made from

a V-band CCD frame covering a region 9 arcminutes square, taken with the

1.1-meter Hall telescope of Lowell Observatory.

Credit: Bill Keel, University of Alabama.