Galaxies clash in four-way merger

Four gigantic galaxies have been seen crashing into one another in one of the biggest cosmic collisions ever seen.

A US team of astronomers observed the four-way cosmic smash-up using Nasa's Spitzer and Chandra space telescopes along with ground-based observatories.

Wowsers would, love to see this, Turns out once combined will be one of the biggest galaxies in the Universe. It will be ten times the mass of our own milky way. The merger is taking place in the giant galaxy cluster CL0958+4702. The four white blobs are galaxies in the process of merging into a single gargantuan one.

Will post the image once ive worked out how to load it




SOURCE



[edit on 6-8-2007 by spencerjohnstone]

But... these are big... and... like far... so... wouldn't this have already happened if we are seeing it right now? I don't understand this light stuff... its confusing, stuff happening and it taking soo long to see it because light is a slow=poke.

^
^^ Yeah,

What we see in this picture is how these four merging galaxies looked at about the same time our sun was blinking into existence, and before the Earth even formed. So I think it's safe to assume that this merger is now completed, and there is one hell of a big galaxy sitting out there right now.

[edit on 113131p://180811 by Soylent Green Is People]

A galaxy orgy....hot. (pun intended)

If, according to "big bangers" the universe is expanding and everything is moving away from everything else, how is this possible?

^
^^The universe "in general" is expanding and "in general" things are moving away from each other, but that doesn't mean that there are not some local instances of gravity causing bodies (or structures) to be attracted to one another.

An small-scale example (but not that relevant of an example) would be Barnard's Star -- it is actually moving toward the sun (relatively speaking). It is presently the 4th closest star to our sun (after the three stars that make up the Centauri system), but in about 10,000 years, it will be our sun's closest stellar neighbor.

A larger example the Sagitarius Dwarf Elliptical Galaxy (SagDEG), which is presently colliding with our own Milky Way Galaxy.

In short, galaxies and even groups of galaxies may be locally attracted to one another, but the fabric of the universe AS A WHOLE is stretching. It may be hard to imagine, but even galaxies are small things compared to the the entire universe.

[edit on 023131p://42082 by Soylent Green Is People]

Thats amazing it would a dream to see it, any way, how can you say it could be one of the biggest in the universe, maybe its one of the smallest, you got to remember we dont have a clue what is out there.


take Care, Vix