Hubble Photo: A Rose Made of Galaxies
Posted on April 20, 2011
The beautiful image above shows a pair of interacting galaxies called Arp 273. The image was released to celebrate the 21st anniversary of the launch of the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.
The distorted shape of the larger of the two galaxies shows signs of tidal interactions with the smaller of the two. Researchers believe the smaller galaxy has actually passed through the larger one. Arp 273 lies in the constellation Andromeda and is roughly 300 million light-years from Earth.
You can see a larger image here and you can read more about the interacting rose galaxies here.