Magnitude +11.2 face-on spiral galaxy NGC 6814 lies in the constellation Aquila, 74.4 million light-years from Earth. Click the image for a full-size view. Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA. Acknowledgement: Judy Schmidt.Spiral galaxies together with irregular galaxies make up approximately 60 percent of the galaxies in the local Universe. However, despite their prevalence, each spiral galaxy is unique — like snowflakes, no two are alike. This is demonstrated by the striking face-on spiral galaxy NGC 6814, whose luminous nucleus and spectacular sweeping arms, rippled with an intricate pattern of dark dust, are captured in this NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image.
NGC 6814 has an extremely bright nucleus, a telltale sign that the galaxy is a Seyfert galaxy. These galaxies have very active centres that can emit strong bursts of radiation. The luminous heart of NGC 6814 is a highly variable source of X-ray radiation, causing scientists to suspect that it hosts a supermassive black hole with a mass about 18 million times that of the Sun.
As NGC 6814 is a very active galaxy, many regions of ionised gas are studded along its spiral arms. In these large clouds of gas, a burst of star formation has recently taken place, forging the brilliant blue stars that are visible scattered throughout the galaxy.
Spiral galaxies make up nearly three quarters of all known galaxies, some with tightly wound arms and other, like NGC 2008, with more wide-open arms wrapped around a compact central bulge.
Imaged by the Hubble Space Telescope, the active Seyfert galaxy NGC 4051 has hosted at least three supernovae since 1983 that were visible to ground- or space-based telescopes on Earth.
