Spiral Galaxy In Centaurus

Seen behind a veil of foreground stars which lie within our own galaxy, this face-on spiral galaxy is about 150 million light-years away and 200,000 light-years across. The brighter foreground stars are marked by diffraction spikes caused by the telescope and yellow vertical stripes due to saturated digital camera pixels in this image from the European Southern Observatory. Tantalizing wisps of more distant, faint galaxies are visible in the background. Credit: FORS1, VLT, ESO Text: APOD