NASA Swift Satellite Maps Stunning Nearby Galaxies in Impressive Images (Video)

NASA's Swift Satellite has captured some spectacular images. The instrument has helped create the most detailed ultraviolet light surveys ever of the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds, the two closest major galaxies.

The Large and Small Magellanic Clouds (LMC and SMC) lie about 163,000 light-years and 200,000 light-years away from Earth, respectively. They orbit each other as well as our own Milky Way Galaxy. Yet compared to the Milky Way, these two bodies are relatively small. The LMC is about one-tenth the size of the Milky Way and contains only one percent of the galaxy's mass. The SMC is even smaller; it's only about half the size of the LMC and contains about two-thirds of its mass.

Despite their sizes, these galaxies loom large in the sky since they're so close to Earth. In order to image both galaxies, Swift's Ultraviolet/Optical Telescope (UVOT) had to take thousands of images. The pictures were taken in three ultraviolet colors centered at wavelengths of 1,928 angstroms, 2,246 angstroms and 2,600 angstroms. The end result was a 160-megapixel mosaic image of the LMC and a 57-megapixel mosaic image of the SMC.

"Prior to these images, there were relatively few UV observations of these galaxies, and none at high resolution across such wide areas, so this project fills in a major missing piece of a scientific puzzle," said Michael Siegel, lead scientists for Swift's UVOT, in a news release.

The images themselves actually reveal about one million ultraviolet sources in the LMC and about 250,000 in the SMC. The images include light ranging from 1,600 to 3,300 angstroms, which is a range of UV wavelengths largely blocked by Earth's atmosphere.

"With these mosaics, we can study how stars are born and evolve across each galaxy in a single view, something that's very difficult to accomplish for our own galaxy because of our location inside it," said Stefan Immler, who first proposed the program, in a news release.

The images themselves are spectacular, showing amazing details and revealing more than ever about the LMC and the SMC. You can check out a video of the mosaics below, originally appearing here.