The Sunflower Galaxy

This is a picture Messier 63, which is known as the Sunflower Galaxy

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This image was taken by the Spitzer Telescope. Spitzer takes images in infrared, so what is mainly highlighted is dust clouds. Messier 63 is called the Sunflower Galaxy because the center of it looks like the center of a sunflower. This galaxy was discovered all the way back in 1779, by Pierre Mechain and is over 27 million light years away.[1][2]

The Sunflower Galaxy is part of the M51 group. This group has a total of eight members. The group is loosely bound together, and two Messier galaxies dominate it. Neither of these galaxies are the Sunflower Galaxy, which is actually one of the smaller ones and the second dimmest.[3][4]

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