Astronomy Picture of the Day

Explanation: Big and beautiful spiral galaxy M81 lies in the northern constellation Ursa Major. One of the brightest galaxies in planet Earth's sky, M81 is also home to the second brightest supernova seen in modern times. This superbly detailed view reveals its bright yellow nucleus, blue spiral arms, and sweeping cosmic dust lanes with a scale comparable to the Milky Way. Hinting at a disorderly past, a remarkable dust lane actually runs straight through the disk, below and right of the galactic center, contrary to M81's other prominent spiral features. The errant dust lane may be the lingering result of a close encounter between M81 and its smaller companion galaxy, M82. Scrutiny of variable stars in M81 (aka NGC 3031) has yielded one of the best determined distances for an external galaxy -- 11.8 million light-years.