The NGC 1386 galaxy as seen by the VLT Survey Telescope and ALMA

This image shows the spiral galaxy NGC 1386 observed by the VLT Survey Telescope (VST), hosted at ESO’s Paranal Observatory in Chile, and the Atacama Large Millimetre/Submillimetre Array (ALMA), operated by ESO and its international partners.

The VST image displays the entire galaxy in visible light, showing how stars are distributed within it. While stars in this galaxy are mostly old, the blue ring at the centre is ripe with stellar clusters full of young stars.

The ALMA image, shown in golden colours, marks the location of multiple clouds of gas ready to form new stars.