The NASA Hubble Space Telescope has taken an image of the spiral galaxy NGC 1827, which is located about 37 million light-years from us in the constellation Columba. The galaxy is seen edge-on, so that its disk appears as a thin strip.
This image is part of a large observing program. Hubble is studying 260 satellite galaxies around 22 large galaxies similar to the Milky Way. All of them are located within a radius of about 32 million light-years from Earth. So far, the telescope has already examined 111 such satellites. To complete the program, another 149 Hubble orbits around Earth will be required - one orbit for each remaining galaxy.
The image was taken with Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys. On the disk of NGC 1827, bright blue regions are visible - active star formation is probably underway there. They are crossed by dark dust lanes. To the left of the galaxy's bright central bulge, a bright star appears in the image. It lies between us and NGC 1827, meaning it belongs to our Galaxy. The four rays radiating from this star are an optical effect: light bends around the internal struts that support Hubble's secondary mirror.
Low-mass galaxies such as those included in this program help test the predictions of cosmological models on small scales. It is precisely on such scales that the models still agree poorly with observations. Hubble data will make it possible to better describe the properties of low-mass galaxies in systems similar to the Milky Way and to refine cosmological models.