#galactic collisions

[bearstarseraphffxi]

The Kraken Galaxy Collision

Epic name.

[alxndrasplace]

(NASA)  Warped Spiral Galaxy ESO 510-13 Image Credit: Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA), C. Conselice (U. Wisconsin/STScI) et al., NASA

How did spiral galaxy ESO 510-13 get bent out of shape? The disks of many spirals are thin and flat, but not solid. Spiral disks are loose conglomerations of billions of stars and diffuse gas all gravitationally orbiting a galaxy center. A flat disk is thought to be created by sticky collisions of large gas clouds early in the galaxy's formation. Warped disks are not uncommon, though, and even our own Milky Way Galaxy is thought to have a small warp. The causes of spiral warps are still being investigated, but some warps are thought to result from interactions or even collisions between galaxies. ESO 510-13, pictured above digitally sharpened, is about 150 million light years away and about 100,000 light years across.

[alxndrasplace]

(NASA)  Galaxy Collisions: Simulation vs Observations Images Credit: NASA, ESA; Visualization: Frank Summers (STScI); Simulation: Chris Mihos (CWRU) & Lars Hernquist (Harvard).

What happens when two galaxies collide? Although it may take over a billion years, such titanic clashes are quite common. Since galaxies are mostly empty space, no internal stars are likely to themselves collide. Rather the gravitation of each galaxy will distort or destroy the other galaxy, and the galaxies may eventually merge to form a single larger galaxy. Expansive gas and dust clouds collide and trigger waves of star formation that complete even during the interaction process. Pictured above is a computer simulation of two large spiral galaxies colliding, interspersed with real still images taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. Our own Milky Way Galaxy has absorbed several smaller galaxies during its existence and is even projected to merge with the larger neighboring Andromeda galaxy in a few billion years.

[atlas-the-worldbuilder]

Here it is, my last post of the year! …until we start again NEXT year! XD

Rather than talking about fireworks, tho, here I’m answering a question regarding much bigger light shows: galactic collisions! As I said, I’ll be going more in-depth on galaxies in a future comic, but I wanted to take time to answer this bit, since it’s my first question here. Thanks to @ask-the-chan-family for the question!

If any of you have questions or funnies for me, feel free to ask! :) And again, Happy New Year!

*Note: I say “nearest”, since galaxies are IMMENSELY far away, but…that’s beside the point.

[aimlessinspace]

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has photographed an unusual structure 100,000 light years long, which resembles a corkscrew-shaped string of pearls and winds around the cores of two colliding galaxies.

The unique structure of the star spiral may yield new insights into the formation of stellar superclusters that result from merging galaxies and gas dynamics in this rarely seen process.

[podcastbits]

StarTalk Radio - Galactic Collisions

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnkuKncs8TQ&w=854&h=510]

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[christinetheastrophysicist]

Did Andromeda crash into the Milky Way 10 billion years ago?

For many years scientists have believed that our Galaxy, the Milky Way, is set to crash into its larger neighbour, the Andromeda Galaxy, in about 3 billion years’ time and that this will be the first time such a collision has taken place. But now a European team of astronomers propose a very different idea; that the two star systems collided once before, some 10 billion years ago and that our understanding of gravity is fundamentally wrong. Remarkably, this would neatly explain the observed structure of the two galaxies and their satellites, something that has been difficult to account for until now.

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