Southern constellation of Sculptor tagged posts

Astronomers spot a Faint Dwarf Galaxy Disrupting a nearby Giant Spiral Galaxy

Figure 1: The giant spiral galaxy NGC 253 (shown in color) is accompanied by a newly discovered dwarf galaxy, NGC 253-dw2 (at upper left). The peculiar, elongated shape of the dwarf implies it is being torn apart by the gravity of the bigger galaxy – which in turn shows irregularities on its periphery that may be caused by the mutual interaction. Click here for the original tiff file. (Image credit: Copyright © 2015 R. Jay GaBany (Cosmotography.com) & Michael Sidonio. Insert image: R. Jay GaBany & Johannes Schedler.)

Figure 1: The giant spiral galaxy NGC 253 (shown in color) is accompanied by a newly discovered dwarf galaxy, NGC 253-dw2 (at upper left). The peculiar, elongated shape of the dwarf implies it is being torn apart by the gravity of the bigger galaxy – which in turn shows irregularities on its periphery that may be caused by the mutual interaction. (Image credit: Copyright © 2015 R. Jay GaBany (Cosmotography.com) & Michael Sidonio. Insert image: R. Jay GaBany & Johannes Schedler.)

An international team led by Aaron Romanowsky of San José State University has used the Subaru Telescope to identify a faint dwarf galaxy disrupting around a nearby giant spiral galaxy. The observations provide a valuable glimpse of a process that is fleeting but important in shaping galaxies.

“The outer region...

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