Happy Sunday, everyone!

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Below are two images of a tiny patch of the night sky. The first image includes the stars, while the second excludes the stars, leaving only galaxies visible. (I have enhanced exposure on the second image so that the galaxies are more apparent.)

At the center of the image is a collection of five galaxies known as Stephan’s Quintet. Four of the five galaxies are located between 210–340 million light-years from our home galaxy, the Milky Way. Those four galaxies will likely merge in the future. The fifth galaxy is only 39 million light-years from the Milky Way but appears to be part of the Quintet because it is visually aligned (from our vantage) with the other four galaxies.

Enjoy!

The same image below has the stars removed, leaving only Stephan’s Quintet and six other galaxies visible. Try to spot the 11 galaxies below, and then compare them to the image above to see how faint they are in the night sky.

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