Astronomers have unveiled Hubble's largest photomosaic…
…a stunning image of the Andromeda galaxy, our neighbor 2.5 million light-years away.
Over the course of a decade, scientists compiled more than 600 individual snapshots to create this portrait.
Why such an ambitious project?
Andromeda is so close to us that its apparent size in the sky is six times the width of the full Moon.
For Hubble’s incredibly focused view, that meant capturing a vast area of space in meticulous detail.
The mosaic reveals the brilliance of 200 million stars, just a fraction of the galaxy's total population.
The 2.5-billion-pixel image lets astronomers study individual stars and uncover Andromeda’s history of collisions and mergers.
Andromeda, or M31, is the largest galaxy in our local group, spanning 220,000 light-years in a spiral shape similar to the Milky Way.
Currently hurtling toward us, it will merge with the Milky Way in about 4.5 billion years.
This cosmic event will reshape the skies, but for now, Andromeda offers a stunning glimpse into the complexity and beauty of galaxies beyond our own.
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