Here are three attractive galaxies that I was able to observe in the past week or so. You will notice that even though they are all spiral galaxies, they exhibit strikingly different appearance.
M74 is a typical spiral galaxy with two clearly defined spiral arms. It is about 35 million lightyears from us, and it is estimated that M74 is home to about 100 billion stars.
Messier 74 (M74) (12 min total exposure Dec 12, 2020)
The Triangulum Galaxy (M33) is a more loosely wound spiral. The Triangulum Galaxy is the third-largest member of the Local Group of galaxies, behind the Milky Way and the Andromeda Galaxy and gets its name from its location in the constellation Triangulum. Most recent estimates put its distance at about 2.5 million lightyears from us.
The Triangulum Galaxy (M33) (20 min total exposure Dec 12, 2020)
Finally here is the Sculptor Galaxy, a spiral galaxy that is tilted closer to edge-on to our view. This galaxy is not a member of our local group of galaxies, but instead a member of the next-closest group. It is about 10 million lightyears distant. The galaxy also gets its name from the constellation Sculptor in which it is located.
You can see that the Sculptor galaxy is dominated by patterns of mottled dust lanes and patches of great complexity that obscure stars behind them.
The Sculptor Galaxy (NGC 253) (15 min total exposure Dec 5, 2020)
