Hubble spots colliding galaxies in a spectacular dance

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Hubble is still providing dramatic pictures of the universe despite the arrival of the
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. NASA and the ESA have
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a Hubble image of Arp-Madore 417-391, a strange galaxy collision about 670 million light-years away. Their gravitational tug-of-war has produced an odd ring-like shape where the two galactic cores are relatively close and the star "plumes" form a circle.

The telescope spotted the merger using its long-serving Advanced Camera for Surveys, which has helped detect
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and even
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. Researchers are using the orbital hardware to build a list of follow-up observations for the much newer James Webb telescope, which has sometimes been used
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to study space objects.

Arp-Madore 417-391 galaxy collision in context

The Arp-Madore 417-391 galaxy collision in its greater context.
ESA/Hubble & NASA, Dark Energy Survey/DOE/FNAL/DECam/CTIO/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA, J. Dalcanton

You may not see Hubble leading these discoveries for much longer. The telescope has suffered a number of
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in recent years, and is expected to plummet to Earth as soon as 2030 if there are no interventions. While NASA and SpaceX are considering
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to keep it active, that extended lifespan isn't guaranteed. This galaxy crash may represent one of the telescope's last hurrahs, even if the observatory has years left in space.

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