Spiral Galaxy NGC 1097
Spiral galaxy NGC 1097 lies 45 million light-years away in the constellation Fornax. Its blue spiral arms are teeming with star-forming regions, highlighted by their pink hue. It alsoThe normal arms obscure its local neighbor, a dwarf galaxy about 40,000 light-years away, in the lower left corner.
NGC 1097 was observed and discovered by William Herschel on October 9, 1970. A total of three supernova explosions have been observed in the galaxy since its discovery.
Observations made with the Very Large Telescope (VLT), a telescope with four 8.2-meter diameter primary mirrors and owned by the European Space Agency (ESO) in Chile, have identified a very large supermassive black hole at the center of the galaxy. The center is also found to be a small example of a type of active galactic nucleus.