Description: M51 Galaxy, known as The Whirlpool Galaxy, is a bright spiral galaxy
fairly close to us (7.5 Megaparsecs = 25 million light years). To the north
of M51, at the top of the picture, is a companion
galaxy which is being disrupted by the gravitational tidal forces of the
main galaxy.
The B-band image was obtained by SAR el Príncipe de
Asturias (Crown Prince of Spain) on his visit to the William Herschel
Telescope the day before the first stone ceremony of the Spanish 10-m
GranTeCan telescope.
Credit: Javier Méndez (ING) and Nik Szymanek.
Date: 2 June 2000.
Technical information:
Telescope: 4.2m William Herschel.
Instrument: Prime Focus Camera.
Detector: EEV 42-80.
Filters and exposure times: B, V and R. Exposure time was 300s in each band.
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