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Mesmerising image reveals the colossal magnetic field of a distant spiral galaxy

Shortpedia

Content Team
Image Credit: Shortpedia

Spiral galaxies look nice and tidy, with most of their stars and gas confined to a disc neatly arranged in swirling spiral arms. But there's a lot more to know about galaxy. The image shows a galaxy called NGC 4217, around 67 million light-years from the Milky Way, viewed edge-on - and pictured amidst a mapped visualisation of the galaxy's vast, complex magnetic field, sprawling out some 22,500 light-years into the space around NGC 4217.