First Science for Large Binocular Telescope

Through some of the very first scientific observations with the brand-new Large Binocular Telescope (LBT) in Arizona, an international team of astronomers has found that a recently discovered tiny companion galaxy to our Milky Way, named the Hercules Dwarf Galaxy, has truly exceptional properties: while basically all of its known peers in the realm of these tiny dwarf galaxies are rather round, this galaxy at a distance of 430,000 Light Years appears highly flattened, either the shape of a disk or of a cigar.

The stars in many large galaxies are arranged in a disk-like configuration, as in our own Milky Way. Yet in smaller galaxies like the Hercules Dwarf, which despite its name has only a 10-millionth as many stars as the Milky Way, a disk-like configuration has never been observed before. Among the millions of well-studied galaxies none has ever been observed to have a cigar-like shape.