Field Notes · Deep-Sky
Anatomy of the Southern Pinwheel
Messier 83 in Hydra — a whole galaxy 15 million light-years away, captured live on the Unistellar Odyssey
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What you're seeing
The CoreGalactic heart
The bright centre — hundreds of billions of stars crowded into the nucleus of the galaxy.
Spiral ArmsSeen face-on
Great lanes of stars and gas winding outward. We see them so clearly because this galaxy faces us almost perfectly head-on.
Star NurseriesGlowing hydrogen
The blue and pink knots strung along the arms are clouds birthing new stars — the same process as the nebulae we capture, 15 million light-years away.
Foreground StarsIn our own galaxy
Every sharp pinpoint around the galaxy is a star in OUR galaxy, sitting far in front. The Pinwheel lies millions of light-years beyond them all.
Reading starlight
A star's colour is its temperature. The crisp pinpoints scattered across this view are foreground stars in our own galaxy, sitting between us and M83 — and their colours sort them by heat: blue suns are scorching, red ones cool and old.
Our own Sun sits in the calm yellow-white middle, around 5,500°C.
A Hot Blue Sun10,000–30,000°C
Young, massive and burning ferociously bright.
A Cool Amber Sun3,000–4,000°C
Older and gentler, glowing like a slow ember.