A new image from the American Space Agency (NASA) Hubble Telescope, also in collaboration with ESA, shows two merging galaxies in system VV689, dubbed Angel Wing.
As NASA detailed in a statement, the two galaxies in VV689 are in the midst of a collision, in contrast to random galaxy alignments that only appear to overlap from our vantage point on Earth.
Galactic interaction left the VV689 system almost completely symmetrical, giving the appearance of a giant array of galactic wings.
The angelic image is from a series of Hubble observations that took a closer look at the ‘Zoo Gems’, interesting galaxies from the citizen science project.
As detailed by NASA, this crowdsourcing program relies on hundreds of thousands of volunteers to classify galaxies and help astronomers wade through a deluge of data from robotic telescopes.
The Hubble telescope captures impressively shaped “objects” in space
The Hubble Space Telescope’s Advanced Camera for Surveys conducted detailed followup observations of notable objects from both projects.
The selected targets also include ringed galaxies, unusual spirals and an impressive array of galaxy mergers such as VV689, according to the information. Check out the impressive tally:
Text with information from NASA
Text with information from NASA