A cosmic ornament decorates the night at this time of year. NGC 1300 is too faint to see with the eye alone. But images reveal one of the most beautiful galaxies in the universe. A long “bar” of stars crosses its middle, with ribbons of stars trailing away from the bar’s ends.

Barred spirals are becoming more common as the universe ages. About seven billion years ago, only 20 percent of spiral galaxies had bars. But in the modern universe, the fraction goes up to about 65 percent. That includes our home galaxy, the Milky Way. So bars may develop naturally as the galaxies age.

The bar funnels gas toward the center of NGC 1300. There, it forms a spiral within a spiral – a disk more than 3,000 light-years across. Some of the gas from the bar pours into a black hole that’s about 75 million times the mass of the Sun – many times the weight of the Milky Way’s black hole.

The bar in NGC 1300 is one of the most impressive yet seen. It spans most of the galaxy’s diameter – about a hundred thousand light-years. That’s about the same size as the Milky Way. The stars in the bar are mostly old and yellow. The stars in the spiral arms are younger and bluer. And more stars are being born there – adding to the beauty of this impressive galaxy.

NGC 1300 is low in the southeast at nightfall, in the constellation Eridanus, the river. But you need a telescope to see it.

Script by Damond Benningfield