Title:[0213] A spiral galaxy, M83 (NGC 5236) Caption:M83 looks much as our own galaxy might if it were seen from above one of its poles from a distance of about 27 million light years. Composed of thousands of millions of stars and huge clouds of dust, M83 is one of the finest examples of a spiral galaxy. It reveals a concentration of older, yellow stars in its central nucleus with younger, blue stars and patchy red clouds of glowing gas and dark dust lanes in the trailing spiral arms. The young, massive stars occasionally explode as supernovae and many have been seen in M83 in the last century. Copyright:(c) 1977 Anglo-Australian Telescope Board, photograph by David Malin Credit:D. F. Malin

Title:[1026] M83, NGC 5236, the "Southern Pinwheel," type Sc spiral galaxy Caption:M83, NGC 5236, the "Southern Pinwheel," type Sc spiral galaxy, in the constellation Hydra. The spiral has two principal arms and a third, fainter one. There has been a remarkable number of supernovae in M83 within less than a century - four since 1923 - compared to the theoretical supernova incidence of one per galaxy every 300 years. M83 is ten million light years away and has a diameter of 30,000 light years. CTIO photograph Copyright: Credit:National Optical Astronomy Observatories