Trio of Galaxies Play Tug of War

space.com ^ | 03/03/09

[KevinDavis]

Three galaxies are playing a game of gravitational tug-of-war that may result in the eventual demise of one of them. A new NASA Hubble Space Telescope image shows the push and pull in action.

Located about 100 million light-years away in the constellation Piscis Austrinus (the Southern Fish), the galaxy interaction may ultimately lead to the three reforming into two larger star cities.

[KevinDavis]

[Larry Lucido]

NGC 7174 is a mangled spiral galaxy that appears as though it is being ripped apart by its close neighbors

Are there galaxy body-shops?

[txnativegop]

Neat photo.

[He Rides A White Horse]

I’ll bet they even have an evil Sith Lord named Obama out there.

[Boiling Pots]

Too bad I can’t see it from my backyard, with binoculars.

[LiberConservative]

TTIWWP.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks KevinDavis.

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[SunkenCiv]

Thanks KevinDavis.

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[NorCoGOP]

NGC 7174 is a mangled spiral galaxy that appears as though it is being ripped apart by its close neighbors

Obama's Fault! (FR tm pending)

[anymouse]

The ultimate “3 body problem.” *

* Astrodynamics humor

And why yes, I am a “rocket scientist” ** :)

** Bachelor of Science in Aerospace Engineering

[grey_whiskers]

I’ll bet they even have an evil Sith Lord named Obama out there.

Darth Nøøb.

[He Rides A White Horse]

Works for me :)

[wastedyears]

I could do that if I could get passed the math.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Related story:

Hubble Photographs Dozens of Colliding Galaxies

*********************EXCERPT***********************

By Andrea Thompson
Staff Writer
posted: 24 April 2008
09:00 am ET

A huge set of new Hubble Space Images show galactic collisions in action and the variety of peculiar forms that merging galaxies can take.

The series of 59 new photographs, released today on the 18^th anniversary of the Hubble Space Telescope's launch, are the largest collection of Hubble images ever released together.

Galaxy mergers are now known to be more common than was previously thought. They were even more common in the early universe than they are today. The early universe was smaller, so galaxies were closer together and therefore more prone to smash-ups. Even apparently isolated galaxies can show signs of past mergers in their internal structure.

Our own Milky Way contains the debris of the many smaller galaxies it has brushed against and devoured in the past. And it hasn't stopped munching away at its neighbors: It is currently absorbing the Sagittarius dwarf elliptical galaxy.

The Milky Way isn't the top predator though, as our giant neighbor, the Andromeda galaxy, is expected to devour the Milky Way in about two billion years. The future resulting elliptical galaxy has already been dubbed "Milkomeda."

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Arp 148, nicknamed Mayall's object, is the aftermath of an encounter between two galaxies, resulting in a ring-shaped galaxy and a long-tailed companion. The collision between the two parent galaxies produced a shockwave effect that first drew matter into the center and then caused it to propagate outwards in a ring. Arp 148 is located in the constellation of Ursa Major, the Great Bear, approximately 500 million light-years away.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

This stunning collision of two galaxies (UGC 4881) has been dubbed The Grasshopper. It has a bright curly tail containing a remarkable number of star clusters. The galaxies, located 500 million light-years away in the constellation Lynx, are thought to be halfway through a merger — the cores of the parent galaxies are still clearly separated, but their discs are overlapping.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Hubble Photos: When Galaxies Collide

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NGC 6670

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This gorgeous pair of overlapping edge-on galaxies, called NGC 6670, glows in the infrared with more than a hundred billion times the luminosity of our sun. Scientists think that NGC 6670 has already experienced at least one close encounter and is now in the early stages of a second.

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NASA, ESA, the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)-ESA/Hubble Collaboration and A. Evans (University of Virginia, Charlottesville/NRAO/Stony Brook University)

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Enlarged image from just above:

This gorgeous pair of overlapping edge-on galaxies, called NGC 6670, glows in the infrared with more than a hundred billion times the luminosity of our sun. Scientists think that NGC 6670 has already experienced at least one close encounter and is now in the early stages of a second.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

NGC 6240 is a peculiar, butterfly- or lobster-shaped galaxy consisting of two smaller merging galaxies. The galaxies, which lie in the constellation of Ophiuchus, the Serpent Holder, some 400 million light-years away, are expected to complete their merger in tens to hundreds of millions of years. As they do, two giant black holes will drift toward one another and eventually merge together into a larger black hole, scientists say.

*************************

I want to see what happens when two black holes merge....