This spiral galaxy is actually blowing out dust and hydrogen gas, making up a cigar smoke all of it’s own, but how is it doing so.
Part of the answer comes from it’s location.
It’s not so far away from M81, a much larger spiral galaxy, which not so long ago was interacting with M82, however this isn’t the cause of the smoke like features.
The interaction with M81 sparked a huge amount of star formation in M82, and as a result, all those huge new blue giant stars, have created a wind which is actively pushing out the dust and gas from the galaxy itself, creating a 10,000 light year long outflow or giant nebula.
In time the star formation will calm down, the bright new stars will go supernova and the feature will vanish, but for now, it’s an extreme example of what interacting galaxies can do, as well as likely quench the galaxy of future dust/gas to create new generations of stars with.
View of the lower forward fuselage, wings and mid-fuselage of Discovery (OV-103) while under construction at Rockwell International’s Palmdale plant 42.
Grand spiral galaxies often seem to get all the glory, flaunting their young, bright, blue star clusters in beautiful, symmetric spiral arms. But small galaxies form stars too, like nearby NGC 6822, also known as Barnard’s Galaxy. ✨
Beyond the rich starfields in the constellation Sagittarius, NGC 6822 is a mere 1.5 million light-years away, a member of our Local Group of galaxies. The small, irregular host galaxy, is one of the Milky Way’s closest neighbors. ✨
I’m planning on running a campaign in the future and this is one of the major NPC’s that people will meet at some point, her name is Genesis and she’s full of so much love.
scars are normal. scars are a physical proof of your body’s ability to heal. scars make it known that you’re alive. you’re marked by life. the raised scars, the keloids, the scars people stare at you for. they’re a visual map of your life & nothing more. scars have no morality scars don’t reflect on the morality of your existence. media loves to portray scars on monsters and villains and leave the heroes to be unmarred, but that narrative does not apply to real life. you’re a whole human being worthy of being seen, loved, respected.
