... Named the Sombrero Galaxy for its hat-like resemblance, M104 features a prominent dust lane and a bright halo of stars and globular clusters . Reasons for the Sombrero 's hat -like appearance include an unusually large and extended central bulge of stars, and dark prominent dust lanes that appear in a disk that we see nearly edge-on . Billions of old stars cause the diffuse glow of the extended central bulge visible in the above image from the 200-inch Hale Telescope . ...