NASA ESA Hubble Image: Galactic Collision

Astronomical pictures sometimes deceive us with tricks of perspective. 

Right in the center of this image, two spiral galaxies appear to be suffering a spectacular collision, with a host of stars appearing to flee the scene of the crash in a chaotic stampede.

However, this is just a trick of perspective.

It is true that two spiral galaxies are colliding, but they are millions of light-years away, far beyond the cloud of blue and red stars that appear to be near the merging spiral.

This sprinkling of stars is actually an isolated, irregular dwarf galaxy named ESO 489-056.

The dwarf galaxy is actually much more distant than many bright stars in the foreground of the image, which are located much closer to us, in the Milky Way.

ESO 489-056 is located 16 million light-years from Earth in the constellation of Canis Major (The Greater Dog), in our local Universe.

It is composed of a few billion red and blue stars—a very small number when compared to galaxies like the Milky Way, which is estimated to contain around 200 to 400 billion stars, or the Andromeda Galaxy, which contains a mind-boggling one trillion.

Hubble captures the result of a galactic collision

Spiral galaxy in the process of colliding with a lenticular galaxy. 

Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, Acknowledgement: Luca Limatola

A new image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope captures an ongoing cosmic collision between two galaxies -- a spiral galaxy is in the process of colliding with a lenticular galaxy.

The collision looks almost as if it is popping out of the screen in 3-D, with parts of the spiral arms clearly embracing the lenticular galaxy's bulge.

The image also reveals further evidence of the collision. There is a bright stream of stars coming out from the merging galaxies, extending out towards the top of the image.

The bright spot in the middle of the plume, known as ESO 576-69, is what makes this image unique.

This spot is believed to be the nucleus of the former spiral galaxy, which was ejected from the system during the collision and is now being shredded by tidal forces to produce the visible stellar stream.