The incredible battle of galaxies photographed by Hubble

Five galaxies that appear to orbit each other: This is the Hickson Compact Group 40 captured by Hubble. A billion years from now, they will collide to become one giant elliptical galaxy.

It’s been another year scanning the sky for Hubble Space Telescope, who is 32 years old. For this occasion, the NASA reveal a picture Hixon Compact 40 also called HCG40, is a strange group of five galaxies. Among them, it is called a galaxy Elliptical and one lenticular galaxy. As for the other three, they are in the form of spirals, like Milky Way.

located in the direction of the constellationhydrathe array is so compact that it fits into an area less than twice the diameter of our stellar disk Milky Way. the reason ? The black matter : Surrounds the five galaxies in a kind of halo. As a result, they are relentlessly close to each other, alienation By their mutual attraction, but also by the attraction black matter, invisible. Hubble watched them at a crucial moment in their lives, and they’re preparing for it Merge one another. Except that the time scales are not the same for us, because the merger will only happen in a billion years!

It’s James Webb’s turn to take charge

Deployed by NASA astronauts into Earth orbit in 1990, it has made over 1.5 million observations of nearly 50,000 celestial bodies! Enough to make great discoveries, like discoveraccelerating the expansion of the universe, or specify its size and age. today, James Webb It prepares to take charge as it continues to calibrate and prepare all of its measuring instruments. Just like its predecessor, the Deep Universe will examine, among all of its objects, those of studying the first moments and formation of galaxies. These could also be in the same state as the HGC40 galaxies, i.e. grouped into dense, compact clusters.