‘Hidden galaxy’ IC 342 imaged by ESA’s Euclid Space Telescope | sorae universe portal website

This is the spiral galaxy IC 342, which is located about 11 million light-years away in the direction of the Kirin constellation. According to the European Space Agency (ESA), IC 342 is about the same size as the full moon, but it is difficult to observe from Earth.

The reason for this is that from Earth, IC 342 appears on the galactic plane of the Milky Way…or in other words, it appears close to the Milky Way. The galactic plane is filled with many stars, interstellar gas, and dark dust that blocks visible light, making it difficult to observe distant celestial bodies in the same direction. For this reason, IC 342 is also known as the “hidden galaxy.”

This image was created based on data acquired by the Visible Light Observer (VIS) and the Near-Infrared Spectrophotometer (NISP) of the European Space Agency’s Euclid Space Telescope. Euclid observes not only visible light, but also infrared wavelengths that cannot be detected by the human eye, so images are colored according to the wavelength at the time of data acquisition.(About 700 nm is colored blue, about 1.1 µm is colored green, and about 1.7 µm is colored red).

The Euclid Space Telescope, which was launched in July 2023, was developed to explore the secrets of dark energy and dark matter. Based on observational data from Euclid, which aims to image billions of galaxies, we will create a 3D map of galaxies distributed along the large-scale structure of the universe, which are thought to be shaped by dark matter. It is also expected to deepen our understanding of dark energy, which is thought to accelerate the expansion of the universe.

According to the European Space Agency, although the central portion of IC 342 has been observed in the past by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and ESA’s Hubble Space Telescope (HST), star formation in all of IC 342 is unlikely. Possible. It would have been impossible to study history. On the other hand, the Euclid Space Telescope has a wide field of view covering the entire galaxy, a resolution that allows it to distinguish between stars and star clusters, and is said to capture starlight as well.

Data from Euclid’s observations will allow us to trace the history of star formation in spiral galaxies like IC 342, which is thought to be similar to the Milky Way, and show how stars formed throughout the history of the galaxy. · It is expected to help us understand more deeply how it develops. The first image was released by the European Space Agency on November 7, 2023 as one of the first full-color images from the Euclid mission.

source

• European Space Agency – Euclid’s view of spiral galaxy IC 342

Text Editing/Syrian Studies Department