Image: X-ray: NASA/CXC/IfA/D. Sanders et al.; optical: NASA/STScI/NRAO/A. Evans et al.
An opening act to their merger millions of years from now, these colliding galaxies get exclamatory in this newly released image from the Chandra X-ray Observatory.
The duo, known collectively as VV 340, consists of the sideways-on North galaxy on top and the face of the south galaxy forming the bottom point.
The vibrant purple glow represents X-ray data, and the shades of red, green and blue are optical information from the Hubble Space Telescope.
Observations from Chandra suggest VV 340 North conceals a rapidly growing supermassive black hole within its stardust.
The cosmic punctuation mark resides some 450 million light years from Earth.
For a preview of the Milky Way's fate, check out our gallery of other wow-worthy cosmic collisions.
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