The Andromeda galaxy like you’ve never seen it before

MANILA, Philippines (UPDATED) – Like taking a photo of a beach and resolving each grain of sand – that is how NASA described the newest photo of our galaxy’s nearest neighbor, the Andromeda galaxy.

NASA unveiled a sweeping, high-definition composite image of the Andromeda galaxy taken by the Hubble Space Telescope, with the highest level of detail never seen before – a gigantic 1.5 billion pixels.

The Hubble was able to resolve individual stars on a 61,000-light-year-long stretch of Andromeda, containing more than 100 million individual stars. As NASA puts it, “It’s like photographing a beach and resolving individual grains of sand.”

“Never before have astronomers been able to see individual stars inside an external spiral galaxy over such a large contiguous area,” NASA said.

The stars are shown in their natural visible-light color, and the cropped view released by NASA shows a segment of the galaxy 48,000-light-years wide.

The photo was made by the Panchromatic Hubble Andromeda Treasury (PHAT) program, using the Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys and the Wide Field Camera 3. The galaxy was viewed using near-ultraviolet, visible, and near-infrared light.

NASA said the image was assembled thanks to 7,398 exposures taken over 411 individual shoots by the telescope.

“Most of the stars in the universe live inside such majestic star cities, and this is the first data that reveal populations of stars in context to their home galaxy,” the agency added.

Hubble will celebrate its 25th year of observing the universe in April. The release of the Andromeda image, as well as of an updated version of the “Pillars of Creation” photo, is part of the lead-up to the NASA anniversary.

Both images were unveiled at the meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Seattle. – Rappler.com