Hubble's view of Hickson Compact Group 31

Esahubble_opo1008b_1024

esahubble_opo1008b February 18th, 2010

Credit: NASA, ESA, J. English (University of Manitoba) and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA). Acknowledgment: S. Gallagher (The University of Western Ontario)

These four dwarf galaxies waited billions of years to come together, setting off a fireworks show as thousands of new star clusters come to life. The distorted galaxies are quickly producing massive, hot, young stars that are pumping out ultraviolet radiation, heating up surrounding gas clouds, and causing them to glow. Such encounters between dwarf galaxies are normally seen billions of light-years away and therefore occurred billions of years ago. But these galaxies, members of Hickson Compact Group 31, are relatively nearby, only 166 million light-years away. In this image, taken by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, the bright, distorted object at middle, left, is actually two colliding dwarf galaxies. Myriad star clusters have formed in the streamers of debris pulled from the galaxies and at the site of their head-on collision. The cigar-shaped object above the galaxy duo is another member of the group. A bridge of star clusters connects the trio. A long rope of bright star clusters points to the fourth member of the group, at lower right. The bright object in the center is a foreground star. Astronomers used Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys to resolve the youngest and brightest of star clusters, which allowed them to calculate the clusters' ages, map the star-formation history, and determine that the galaxies are starting the final stages of galaxy assembly. Hubble reveals that the brightest clusters, hefty groups each holding at least 100,000 stars, are less than 10 million years old. Astronomers say the interacting galaxies will form a large elliptical galaxy in another billion years. The Advanced Camera for Surveys data were taken on 8 August 2006. The principal investigator was Jane Charlton of Pennsylvania State University, University Park (USA).

Provider: Hubble Space Telescope | ESA

Image Source: https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/opo1008b/

Curator: ESA/Hubble, Garching bei München, Germany

Image Use Policy: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

Image Details

Image Type
Observation
Object Name
HCG 31 Hickson Compact Group 31
Subject - Local Universe
Galaxy > Grouping > Cluster
Esahubble_opo1008b_128
 

Position Details

Position (ICRS)
RA = 5h 1m 39.7s
DEC = -4° 16’ 22.3”
Orientation
North is 110.0° CCW
Field of View
3.0 x 2.3 arcminutes
Constellation
Eridanus

Color Mapping

  Telescope Spectral Band Wavelength
Red Hubble (ACS) Infrared (I) 814.0 nm
Green Hubble (ACS) Optical (V) 606.0 nm
Blue Hubble (ACS) Optical (B) 435.0 nm
Spectrum_base
Red
Green
Blue
Esahubble_opo1008b_1280
×
ID
opo1008b
Subject Category
C.5.5.3  
Subject Name
HCG 31, Hickson Compact Group 31
Credits
NASA, ESA, J. English (University of Manitoba) and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA). Acknowledgment: S. Gallagher (The University of Western Ontario)
Release Date
2010-02-18T15:00:00
Lightyears
Redshift
Reference Url
https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/opo1008b/
Type
Observation
Image Quality
Distance Notes
Facility
Hubble Space Telescope, Hubble Space Telescope, Hubble Space Telescope
Instrument
ACS, ACS, ACS
Color Assignment
Red, Green, Blue
Band
Infrared, Optical, Optical
Bandpass
I, V, B
Central Wavelength
814, 606, 435
Start Time
Integration Time
Dataset ID
Notes
Coordinate Frame
ICRS
Equinox
J2000
Reference Value
75.4153480401, -4.27285240196
Reference Dimension
2514.0, 1940.0
Reference Pixel
1257.0, 970.0
Scale
-1.96272051502e-05, 1.96272051502e-05
Rotation
109.95999999999994
Coordinate System Projection:
TAN
Quality
Full
FITS Header
Notes
Creator (Curator)
ESA/Hubble
URL
http://www.spacetelescope.org/
Name
Email
Telephone
Address
Karl-Schwarzschild-Strasse 2
City
Garching bei München
State/Province
Postal Code
D-85748
Country
Germany
Rights
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
Publisher
ESA/Hubble
Publisher ID
esahubble
Resource ID
opo1008b
Metadata Date
2010-02-15T12:40:08-05:00
Metadata Version
1.1
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Detailed color mapping information coming soon...

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There is no distance meta data in this image.

 

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