Hubble Sees Galaxy on Edge

FOR RELEASE: 9:00 am (EDT) June 8, 2006

PHOTO NO.: STScI-PRC06-24

HUBBLE SEES GALAXY ON EDGE

This is a unique view of the disk galaxy NGC 5866 tilted nearly edge-on
to our line-of-sight. Hubble's sharp vision reveals a crisp dust lane
dividing the galaxy into two halves. The image highlights the galaxy's
structu a subtle, reddish bulge surrounding a bright nucleus, a blue
disk of stars running parallel to the dust lane, and a transparent
outer
halo. NGC 5866 is a disk galaxy of type "S0" (pronounced s-zero).
Viewed
face on, it would look like a smooth, flat disk with little spiral
structure. It remains in the spiral category because of the flatness of
the main disk of stars as opposed to the more spherically rotund (or
ellipsoidal) class of galaxies called "ellipticals." Such S0 galaxies,
with disks like spirals and large bulges like ellipticals, are called
'lenticular' galaxies. NGC 5866 lies in the Northern constellation
Draco, at a distance of 44 million light-years. It has a diameter of
roughly 60,000 light-years only two-thirds the diameter of the Milky
Way, although its mass is similar to our galaxy. This Hubble image of
NGC 5866 is a combination of blue, green and red observations taken
with
the Advanced Camera for Surveys in February 2006.

Credit: NASA, ESA, and The Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)
Acknowledgment: W. Keel (University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa)

To see and read more about lenticular galaxy NGC 5866 on the Web,
visit:
http://hubblesite.org/news/2006/24
http://heritage.stsci.edu/2006/24

For more information, contact:
Keith Noll, Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Md.,
(phone) 410-338-1828, (fax) 410-338-4579, (e-mail) or

Bill Keel, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, Ala., (phone)
205-348-5050, (fax) 205-348-5051, (e-mail)

The Hubble Space Telescope is an international cooperative project
between NASA and the European Space Agency. The Space Telescope Science
Institute is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities for
Research in Astronomy, Inc., Washington.