Start working and catch galaxies dancing

2008/11/04 Lakar Iraizoz, Oihane - Elhuyar Zientzia

• Astronomia

The Hubble Space Telescope has remained for a month without sending an image for a technical problem. Astronomers have not managed to solve the problem, but they have set up the spare tools available to the space telescope and have Hubble work again. The first result was a photograph of the pair of galaxies called Arp 147.

It can be observed that the right galaxy of the image has an annular shape. It is not the proper form of this galaxy. According to astronomers who received the image, the gravity fields of these two galaxies interact with each other and, apparently, the galaxy on the left of the image crossed the one on the right, which caused one galaxy to ring the other.

The fact that the ring is blue indicates that stars are forming there. The collision of both galaxies caused the formation of a high density wavy ring that began to move outwards, just as the waves that occur when we throw a stone into a water well move outwards. On the way out, the wave collided with the materials and gas that went into the galaxy, causing the stars to appear.

Image courtesy of: NASA, ESA and M. Livio (STScI)