When Galaxies Collide: Antennae Galaxy
Credit: NASA
The Antennae galaxy is located 45 million light years away from Earth in the constellation Corvus. The image above shows a zoomed out shot of the galaxies interacting with each other. The story goes that about 1.2 billion years ago there were two galaxies known as NGC 4038 and NGC 4039. The two galaxies that have collided with each other and it get’s its name Antennae from the two streaks of gas and stars resulted from the galactic collision. The nuclei of the two galaxies has merged together to create one giant galaxy. Interestingly astronomers say that it’s not the stars that collide together but the gas and molecular clouds that collide and have ferocious formations of stars. The view above spans over 500,000 light years.
Antennae Galaxy. Credit: NASA