Messier 81, NGC 3031 or Bode's Galaxy)

This galaxy never gets old to revisit. Quite a spectacle!

One of the brightest galaxies in planet Earth's sky is similar in size to our Milky Way Galaxy: big, beautiful M81. The grand spiral galaxy can be found toward the northern constellation of the Great Bear (Ursa Major). This superbly detailed image reveals M81's bright yellow nucleus, blue spiral arms, telltale pinkish star forming regions, and sweeping cosmic dust lanes with a scale comparable to the Milky Way.

Hinting at a disorderly past, a remarkable dust lane actually runs straight through the disk, to the top of the galactic center, contrary to M81's other prominent spiral features. The errant dust lane may be the lingering result of a close encounter between M81 and its smaller companion galaxy, M82. Scrutiny of variable stars in M81 has yielded one of the best determined distances for an external galaxy -- 11.8 million light-years. M81's dwarf companion galaxy Holmberg IX can be seen left center the large spiral.

Surrounding this galaxy is the very faint Integrated Flux Nebula (IFN). Unlike other star forming nebulas in our galaxy’s spiral arms, this wispy nebula lies away from our galaxies and is energized by all the stars in our galaxies. It’s mainly composed of dust, hydrogen and carbon monoxide and is very prevalent around the Celestial Pole where you find this galaxy pair.

Taken from DGRO and SWO at Dark Sky New Mexico
24”CDK, 17”CDK and 14.5" RCOS

Luminance 1100, Red 240, Green 240, Blue 240

Enjoy,

Mark