Picture of the week: ESA releases beautiful image of elusive galaxy in the Cetus constellation

NGC 45 is a low surface brightness galaxy, a group of galaxies that are usually difficult to spot as they are even fainter than the night sky. The stars in these galaxies are relatively few, compared to the gas and dark matter present in them, this means they don't shine brightly, hence the name. This explains why the recent zoom-in shot of NGC 45 by the Hubble Space Telescope is something interesting.

The image shows NGC 45's spiral arms, filled with stars (visible as tiny blue dots) and glowing pink clouds — star-forming regions, known as nebulae. The image is a combination of data from two observing programs, one of which conducted a broad observation of 50 nearby galaxies, leveraging the ultraviolet and near-infrared bands. The other narrowed in on H-alpha light — a specific wavelength of red light produced by hydrogen.

Although NGC 45 was first spotted by English astronomer John Herschel in 1835, scientists only made the first discovery of a sizable low surface brightness galaxy with the 1986 discovery of Malin 1. Research suggests that these elusive galaxies may make up 30 to 60% of all galaxies in the universe.

With a mid-sized telescope, you can zoom in on the Whale constellation, and under the right viewing conditions, you can catch a glimpse of NGC 45.