NGC 710 facts for kids
NGC 710 is a fascinating galaxy that looks like a giant pinwheel. It's located in the Andromeda constellation, which is a group of stars that form a pattern in our night sky.
This galaxy is incredibly far from our own Milky Way galaxy. It's about 280 million light-years away! A light-year is the distance light travels in one year, so 280 million light-years is a truly enormous distance across space.
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What is NGC 710?
NGC 710 is known as a spiral galaxy. Imagine a giant cosmic pinwheel or a spinning frisbee with arms curling out from the center. That's what a spiral galaxy looks like! Our own Milky Way galaxy is also a spiral galaxy.
These galaxies are made up of billions of stars, along with gas, dust, and dark matter. Everything spins around a central point, often with a supermassive black hole at its heart.
Where is NGC 710 located?
NGC 710 is found in the Andromeda constellation. A constellation is like a connect-the-dots picture made by stars in the night sky. The Andromeda constellation is named after a princess from ancient Greek stories.
Even though NGC 710 is in the direction of Andromeda, it's much, much farther away than the stars that make up the constellation itself. Those stars are relatively close to us in the Milky Way.
How far away is NGC 710?
Measuring distances in space is tricky because everything is so far away. Scientists use a unit called a light-year. One light-year is the distance that light travels in one whole year. Light moves incredibly fast, about 300,000 kilometers (186,000 miles) per second!
So, when we say NGC 710 is 280 million light-years away, it means the light we see from it today actually left the galaxy 280 million years ago. We are essentially looking back in time when we observe distant galaxies like NGC 710.
Who discovered NGC 710?
NGC 710 was discovered by an Irish astronomer named Bindon Blood Stoney. He first observed this galaxy in 1850. Astronomers like Stoney used telescopes to scan the night sky, looking for new and interesting objects beyond our solar system.
The "NGC" in NGC 710 stands for "New General Catalogue." This is a famous list of deep-sky objects, including galaxies, star clusters, and nebulae, that was put together in the late 1800s.
Is NGC 710 a radio galaxy?
Yes, NGC 710 is also known as a radio galaxy. This means it gives off strong radio waves, which are a type of electromagnetic radiation, just like visible light. However, we can't see radio waves with our eyes.
Scientists use special telescopes called radio telescopes to detect these waves. Radio galaxies often have very active centers, possibly with supermassive black holes that are pulling in matter and shooting out powerful jets of energy, which create the radio emissions.
