Hubble Snaps Stunning Image Of Two Distant, Gravitationally Interacting Galaxies

Astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope have captured a stunning new image of two galaxies gravitationally interacting with each other. The image of the two galaxies (collectively known as NGC 3447) located about 60 million light-years from Earth was captured using the telescope’s Wide Field Camera 3.

In the image, the diffuse and patchy blue glow on the right in NGC 3447B, while the smaller clump on the left is NGC 3447A.

“We’re unsure what each looked like before they began to tear one another apart. The two sit so close that they are strongly influenced and distorted by the gravitational forces between them, causing the galaxies to twist themselves into the unusual and unique shapes seen here,” the European Space Agency (ESA) said in a statement accompanying the image. “NGC 3447A appears to display the remnants of a central bar structure and some disrupted spiral arms, both properties characteristic of certain spiral galaxies. Some identify NGC 3447B as a former spiral galaxy, while others categorize it as being an irregular galaxy.”

This is not the first time Hubble has snapped an image of a galaxy that defies categorization, or of collision between two galaxies, for that matter. In January, NASA and the ESA released an image of NGC 4861 — a galaxy whose mass, size and rotational velocity resemble those of a spiral galaxy, while its diffuse appearance makes it look like a dwarf irregular galaxy.

A few days prior to that, the space agencies released an image of a structure named IRAS 14348-1447, which is believed to have been created when two gas-rich spiral galaxies ventured too close sometime in the past, each getting caught in the other’s gravitational pull — an act of mutual destruction that ended with the galaxies merging into one.

The Hubble Space Telescope was launched aboard NASA’s space shuttle Discovery on April 24, 1990. Since then, it has not only captured photos of an unimaginable number of truly spectacular nebulae and galaxies, it has also peered back over 13 billion years to look at our cosmos in its infancy, giving us, as NASA aptly said in an earlier statement, “a front row seat to the awe inspiring universe we live in."