It is a composite of three exposures in different wavebands, cf. The full-resolution version of this photo retains the orginal pixels.
North is up and East is left.
He and Mark Neeser , also from the Kapteyn Institute, produced the composite images. A great amount of fine detail is revealed, from the structures in the pronounced dust band in the equatorial plane, to many faint background galaxies that shine through the outer regions. This makes it possible to follow the spiral structure almost all the way round. The dark areas around the stars and galaxies in the field are artefacts of the image processing. This galaxy is notable for its dominant nuclear bulge , composed primarily of mature stars, and its nearly edge-on disk composed of stars, gas, and intricately structured dust.