Galaxy mergers are a spectacularly beautiful phenomenon, recently the famous NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope launched since 1990 captured a stunning picture of two colliding galaxies whose symmetrical shape gives the impression of observing “galactic wings” (see header image). This fusion occurred in the VV689 system, which was nicknamed “Angel Wing”, in Spanish “angel wings”, due to its unique formation and figure. You can download the image as wallpaper through “Hubble Inspects a Set of Galactic Wings”
It is described on the official website of NASA|ESA Hubble that “Unlike chance alignments of galaxies that only appear to overlap from our vantage point on Earth, the two galaxies in VV689 are in the midst of a collision.” Although we are very amazed by these types of events due to the colossal images that they give us, in reality galactic collisions are not strange, these interactions are currently taking place in multiple events in the universe.
In fact, our spiral galaxy to which the solar system and planet Earth belong, the Milky Way, suffered various collisions with smaller galaxies in the past for its formation, likewise, other mergers with neighboring galaxies are expected in the future. Researchers are interested in these phenomena because the study of the formation and interaction of galaxies reveals information regarding their evolution and this might help explain the origin of the universe itself.
In reality, all large galaxies have been formed by different collisions and interactions with smaller galaxies in events that last billions of years and this interaction gives them the particular formation pattern that we observe. The given interaction between these components of the cosmos is attributed to one of the most important forces in the universe that explains a large part of its formation, gravity, which reaches its maximum expression to allow the approach and subsequent collision of galaxies.
Likewise, it is believed that galactic interactions have a very important connection with the birth of stars since their collision is accompanied by bursts of star formation, although the estimation of their effect is still in question.
Finally, the stunning image of colliding angel wings is part of a dataset from the “Galaxy Zoo” which is an astronomy project whose objective is to classify galaxies from robotic telescope data that is reported as a “citizen science” event since it requests the support of volunteers to explore the 100 billion galaxies that are recognized in the universe . With this, describe Galaxy Zoo that his intention is “to try to understand these processes and discover what galaxies can tell us regarding the past, present and future of the universe as a whole.”
Report of NASA|ESA Hubble.
Share science, share knowledge.
