Glossary term: Galaxie à disque

Description: Une galaxie à disque est un type de galaxie qui présente une composante plate d'étoiles, de gaz et de poussières, toutes en mouvement circulaire coplanaire autour du centre de la galaxie. Les bras spiraux et l'activité de formation d'étoiles qui y est associée sont souvent présents dans ces disques. Dans la plupart des systèmes de classification des galaxies, les galaxies à disque se distinguent des galaxies elliptiques, irrégulières et naines.

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Term and definition status: The original definition of this term in English have been approved by a research astronomer and a teacher
The translation of this term and its definition is still awaiting approval

The OAE Multilingual Glossary is a project of the IAU Office of Astronomy for Education (OAE) in collaboration with the IAU Office of Astronomy Outreach (OAO). The terms and definitions were chosen, written and reviewed by a collective effort from the OAE, the OAE Centers and Nodes, the OAE National Astronomy Education Coordinators (NAECs) and other volunteers. You can find a full list of credits here. All glossary terms and their definitions are released under a Creative Commons CC BY-4.0 license and should be credited to "IAU OAE".

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This galaxy has a large bulge surrounded by a ring of dust creating an image similar to the mexican hat with the same name

Sombrero galaxy

Caption: This prominent galaxy M 104 is often called the Sombrero galaxy due to its resemblance to the Mexican hat. This look is created by the thin disk oriented nearly edge-on, which appears illuminated by the dominant bulge. Both, the disk and bulge contain stars, but the stars in the bulge tend to be older, while the disk also harbors large amounts of dust and gas creating shadows. M 104 is located in the constellation Virgo approximately 50 light-years away. While some of the dots visible in the picture are foreground stars and others background galaxies, the majority are actually globular clusters, dense massive clusters of stars, associated with the Sombrero Galaxy.
Credit: ESO/P. Barthel credit link

License: CC-BY-4.0 Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) icons

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