Galactic Twin NGC 6744

Behold NGC 6744, a spiral galaxy bearing similarities to our home galaxy, the Milky Way. This cosmic twin is captured here in stunning detail by the Dark Energy Camera (DECam) on the Víctor M. Blanco 4-meter Telescope at the U.S. National Science Foundation Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO), a Program of NSF NOIRLab in Chile. Located around 30 million light-years away in the constellation Pavo, NGC 6744 exhibits a luminous core and spiral arms spanning 175,000 light-years across, a larger but similar anatomy to our Milky Way. Moreover, to the lower right of NGC 6744, at the end of the spiral arm, is a faint blob. This is its companion galaxy known as NGC 6744A. The companionship between these galaxies is analogous to that between the Milky Way and its dwarf companion the Large Magellanic Cloud. Though it’s impossible to get an external view of our galaxy, these similarities offer insight into how the Milky Way might look to a distant observer.

This is one of the deepest images of NGC 6744 ever taken, and keen observers can spy the faint extended arm on the left hand side of the galaxy — rarely visible in most images.

This image is part of the DESI Legacy Imaging Surveys, an ambitious effort to construct the largest 3D map of the night sky with the DOE-built DECam on the Blanco Telescope at NSF CTIO and other Programs of NSF NOIRLab.