Hubble Telescope Spots A Galaxy Hidden in Dark Dust Cloud

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has recently spotted a new photo of the spiral galaxy called IC 4633. This galaxy has billions of stars and hosts an active galactic nucleus at its centre. It is located 100 million light-years away in the constellation Apus, reports NASA.

However, our view of the galaxy is partially hidden due to a swath of dark dust clouds, noticeable in the lower-right portion of the image captured by the telescope, NASA said. The Hubble astronomers said, “From our point of view, IC 4633 is tilted mostly towards us, giving us a fairly good view of its billions of stars. However, we can't fully appreciate the features of this galaxy — at least in visible light — because it's partially concealed by a stretch of dark dust,” according to sci.news.

The cloud that overlaps with IC 4633 is located east of the well-known Cha I, II, and III clouds and is referred to as MW9 or the South celestial serpent, said the astronomers. It is classified as an integrated flux nebula (IFN), which means that it is a cloud of gas and dust within the Milky Way galaxy that is not closely related to any single star, but is faintly illuminated by the combined light of all the galaxy's stars instead, says the space station.

NASA revealed that the dust clouds covering the galaxy IC 4633 are part of the Chamaeleon star-forming region, which is relatively close to us, only about 500 light-years away, within our Milky Way galaxy. The Chamaeleon region covers a significant portion of the southern sky, including its namesake constellation and neighbouring ones like Apus. Scientists have extensively studied this region because it is home to many young stars, with a particular focus on the Cha I cloud, which has been observed by both the Hubble Space Telescope and the upcoming NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope.