Astrophotographer Ronald Brecher has captured a stunning image of our neighboring spiral galaxy, Andromeda, shining in deep space some 2.5 million light-years from Earth.

Brecher's image captured spectacular detail in the sweeping spiral arms of the 260,000 light-year-wide galaxy gleaming with the intense light of star formation. Dense dust lanes can be seen coiling around Andromeda's glowing galactic center, which is thought to house a supermassive black hole 140 million times more massive than our sun.

The nearby satellite galaxy M32 can also be seen as a bright ball on the upper edge of Andromeda's disk while the milky splash of light below is in fact the elliptical galaxy Messier 110, which plays host to around 10 billion stars of its own.

Brecher captured Andromeda's ancient light

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