Andromeda is the closest galaxy to us, estimated to be some 2.57 million light years away, and moving towards us. Our two galaxies will collide and interact in about 4.5 billion years from now, forming one bigger galaxy.
Andromeda (M31) is a spiral galaxy and it has two much smaller satellite galaxies: M32 and M110. Andromeda is about 220 thousands light years across and is estimated to have about 1 trillion stars.
Data: Luka Pesic, Bobi Panov and Goran Petrov
Processing: Goran Petrov
License: Creative Commons BY NC (free for non-commercial use, with attribution).
Click on the image to view in full size.
Location: s. German, Rankovce, Macedonia
Date: 2016-08-25
Total integration time: 1 hour
Camera: Canon 50d (modified)
Telescope: Scopos 560mm refractor
frames: 23 x 3 min
Exposure settings: ISO 800
Processed in PixInsight.