The Hubble Space Telescope, which recently completed 35 years in the vaccum of space, has sent a mesmerising new image of Messier 77, a spiral galaxy also known as the “Squid Galaxy,” glittering against the darkness 45 million light-years away in the constellation Cetus, or “The Whale”.
The aquatic-themed portrait highlights the galaxy’s swirling arms and bright core, which, thanks to Hubble’s advanced imaging, now appear more intricate and vibrant than ever before. Messier 77’s story begins in 1780, when French astronomer Pierre Mechain first spotted the object and, alongside Charles Messier, catalogued it as a potential comet.
Early astronomers, limited by the telescopes of their era, mistook the galaxy for a nebula or even a star cluster-a misconception that persisted for over a century until the true nature of spiral nebulae as distant galaxies was uncovered.
The galaxy’s recent nickname, the “Squid Galaxy,” stems from its extended, filamentary structures that curl around its disk, resembling the tentacles of a squid.