NASA and ESA’s Hubble Space Telescope has unveiled a stunning new image of Messier 82 (M82) popularly known as the Cigar Galaxy revealing its smoldering, star-packed core in unprecedented detail. Located just 12 million light-years away in the Ursa Major constellation, M82 is a starburst galaxy, forming stars at a rate 10 times faster than the Milky Way.

The image showcases sculptural clouds of dust and gas surrounding super star clusters, each containing hundreds of thousands of stars. This latest view includes data from Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys, offering a sharper look at the galaxy’s dynamic heart.

NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, Spitzer Space Telescope, and the James Webb Space Telescope have also contributed multi-wavelength data, combining visible, infrared, and X-ray views to build a comprehensive portrait of M82’s stellar evolution and interstellar environment.