NASA's Hubble spies a spiral snowflake!

Photo Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA

New Delhi: The US space agency NASA recently released a beautiful image of a spiral galaxy.

Spiral galaxy is unique like snowflakes and make up approximately 60 percent of the galaxies in the local universe.

This is demonstrated by the striking face-on spiral galaxy NGC 6814, whose luminous nucleus and spectacular sweeping arms, rippled with an intricate pattern of dark dust.

NGC 6814 has an extremely bright nucleus, a telltale sign that the galaxy is a Seyfert galaxy.

As NGC 6814 is a very active galaxy, many regions of ionized gas are studded along its spiral arms. In these large clouds of gas, a burst of star formation has recently taken place, forging the brilliant blue stars that are visible scattered throughout the galaxy.

The luminous heart of NGC 6814 is a highly variable source of X-ray radiation, causing scientists to suspect that it hosts a supermassive black hole with a mass about 18 million times that of the sun.

The image is captured by NASA/ESA's Hubble Space Telescope.

Source: NASA/European Space Agency