Located about 50 million light-years away, the galaxy's two spiral arms extending from a pronounced central bar give it an ominous hook-shaped appearance.
This striking color image also shows obscuring dust lanes, young blue star clusters and reddish star forming regions surrounding a core of yellowish light from an older population of stars.
But the star forming regions seem more concentrated along the drawn-out northern (top) spiral arm.
The distorted structure is likely the result of a close encounter with a smaller galaxy located just outside this telescopic field of view.
The picture spans about 1/6 of a degree, or 150,000 light years at the estimated distance of NGC 2442.
