By Rick Adams
13, Sep 2024
Some stunning red formations of a nearby galaxy are clearly outlined in a new picture from the Hubble Space Telescope.
Around 3 billion light years away, birds the eye of humans and Andromeda—the galaxy next closest to the Milky Way. 5 million light-years away. With an estimated size of about 152,000 light years, it is almost as heavy as the Milky Way.
An updated picture of Hubble was made on 30 August that reveals the details of the northeast part of the galaxy with its spiral patterns and strip of ionized gas that helps in the making of stars.
Stellar nurseries and supernovas make up this environment, giving a boost to the hydrogen gas, which is then turned into a garden of roses adorned with sparkling stars in the sky, according to NASA officials.
JOHDR was incorporated with Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys and the Wide Field Camera 3 to look through the screen of gases and focus on Andromeda’s spiral structure to investigate the galaxy’s pool of stars.
Provider of the Astronomical Archives, the scope of the study included a very wide range of stars, giving not only a transparent look at the past and variety of stars in Andromeda but also gave more light on the formation and evolution of stars in general, said the NASA officials in the statement.
Therefore, by observing such stars in the solar vicinity, astronomers can study other stars within galaxies of the remote universe.
Some cosmologists have postulated that Andromeda is actually moving towards the Milky Way because of gravitational forces between Andromeda and Milky Way galaxies and the core of dark matter.
Finally, the two galaxies are expected to merge in a direct central collision in about 2 billion to 4 billion years that will change the morphology of the Andromeda galaxy as well as the Milky Way as seen today. Nevertheless, there is new and mature work questioning this collision theory—hence, maybe only future findings could tell.