James Webb captures an amazing galactic merger

dramatic: This is the adjective that astronomers use to describe one of the many images taken by a telescope James Webb by NASA and the European Space Agency. The device, which has become increasingly famous for its sharp images that show the universe in every detail, has been immortalized A galactic merger of cosmic proportionsWhy was this term “strong” used?

First of all, we are talking about II ZW 96, a double galaxy located about half a billion light years from Earth, more precisely in constellation dolphin. In the image made public in the past few hours, the bright cores of each star cluster were clearly visible, even if both arms were distorted by the collision.

galactic merger picture

The galactic merger was indeed of great magnitude: this pair of galaxies is nothing but a galaxy in turn, however Ultra bright infrared. It has not yet reached its final stage. In fact, this isn’t the first time ZW 96 has ended up in the center of scientists’ attention. The Hubble telescope was already able to take a very interesting picture of the merger in 2008, but James Webb went further, as has been the case in many other positions for some time now. It is easy to see the advantages of the new space device.

Thanks to new images related to galactic mergers, it is possible to see the structure of both galaxies as they interact. It is easy to imagine the consequences of all this, One big galaxy in a larger size. So the NASA and ESA telescopes showed what was the background to the phenomenon in question best. There are no minor stars however Other galaxies are much further away It still has to be checked. The colors are great to say the least. As far as the galactic nuclei region is concerned, blue predominates, while the arms have dots ranging from red to orange.

How was the galactic merger depicted?

The difference in color in this galactic merger can be explained by the fact: in the arms there are stars at the beginning of their lives, unlike in the core. To reach the surprising result in terms of sharpness, James Webb used two tools. Merry It works to enhance spectral observation at wavelengths in the mid-infrared, while yoke camera It is an infrared camera. At the same time, many other filters have been used for a broader set of information. Finally, there is a detail that is worth focusing on when talking about the II ZW 96.

In general, the luminosity of galaxies like the one we are talking about is very high, up to 100 billion times from the sun. That’s why we talk about ultra-bright infrared galaxies: there are systems that are much brighter, so much so that we’re talking about ultra-luminous galaxies. However, in most cases, It emits 90% of the light in the infrared range. Astronomers are still at the beginning of studying such phenomena and it is possible that in the next few months (even in the next few years of course) there will be new discoveries and above all new certainties.