Messier 65 -

Messier 65

This photograph has been obtained by David Malin with the Anglo-Australian

telescope. Messier 65 is seen as an elegant, almost edge-on spiral galaxy with

a prominent central bulge. Apart from this bulge, the only other prominent

feature of M65 is its yellow-brown dust lane, which so obviously surrounds

the galaxy but is only clearly seen where it hids a bright background.

Elsewhere, dust is associated with bright, clumpy knots of star formation

visible along the inner spiral arms. While M65 is in gravitational interaction

with its close neighbors M66 and

NGC 3628, it seems that the appearance of

this galaxy was not significantly influenced by this interaction.

This image was obtained from 3 photographic plates of different

emulsion/filter combinations. The green plate was exposed 22 minutes, the

red and blue 27 minutes each.

This images is copyrighted and may be used for private purpose

only. For any other kind of use, including internet mirroring and storing on

CD-ROM, please contact