Starship Asterisk*

The picture is beautiful ... The first thing I thought was ... "Do you suppose this could be two galaxies interacting? One passing through the other?" I do know there are some simulations of how two galaxies interact gravitationally so I wonder it this particular orientation could result?

Kind of like a wheel within a wheel! 8-)

It's a gorgeous image, really.

I like the treatment of the Milky Way stars in your image processing... They really look much closer than the galaxy (which of course they are).

-Noel

You can see many background galaxies way in the distant.

From one of the links:
[quote][size=120][b]Asterisms and subdivison[/b][/size]

* [b]Testudo[/b] (the Turtle):[1] 24 - 27 - YY(30) - 33 - 29 Psc.[2]

This was an obsolete constellation located between the constellations of Pisces and Cetus, today constituting a natural but faint asterism, where the star 20 Psc is intended to be the head of the turtle. [/quote]!!!!

Fear the turtle!

This is a wonderful image. The central galaxy looks great! (Such a cool galaxy!) I also like this pair of spirals, one edge-on, one face-on, in the lower left of the image:
[attachment=0]more galaxies.jpg[/attachment]

The middle does sort of resemble an upside down Egyptian Ankh. Although one end is more looped than triangular.

[url=http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110122.html][img]http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/calendar/S_110122.jpg[/img] [size=150]Polar Ring Galaxy NGC 660[/size][/url]

[b] Explanation: [/b] NGC 660 lies near the center of [url=http://sleshin.startlogic.com/stargazergallery/main.php?g2_itemId=391&g2_imageViewsIndex=0]this intriguing skyscape[/url], swimming in the boundaries of the [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pisces_(constellation)]constellation Pisces[/url]. Over 20 million light-years away, its peculiar appearance marks it as [url=http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap070216.html]a polar ring galaxy[/url]. A rare galaxy type, polar ring galaxies have a substantial population of stars, gas, and dust [url=http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap990510.html]orbiting in rings[/url] nearly perpendicular to the plane of the galactic disk. [url=http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0301391]The bizarre configuration[/url] could have been caused by the chance capture of material from a passing galaxy by the disk galaxy, with the captured debris strung out in a rotating ring. [url=http://www.obspm.fr/actual/nouvelle/apr03/prg.en.shtml]The polar ring component[/url] can be used to explore the shape of the galaxy's otherwise unseen [url=http://www.solstation.com/x-objects/darkhalo.htm]dark matter halo[/url] by calculating the [url=http://chandra.harvard.edu/xray_astro/dark_matter/index.html]dark matter's[/url] gravitational influence on the rotation of the ring and disk. Broader than the disk, NGC 660's ring spans about 40,000 light-years.

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