Surprisingly
complex loops and blobs of cosmic dust lie hidden in the giant elliptical
galaxy NGC 1316.
This
image was created from data gathered by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope and shows
dust lanes and star clusters in this giant galaxy.Astronomers say these characteristics give a
clue as to how this galaxy was formed.
Astronomers
conclude that these dusty star clusters give clear evidence of a major
collision of two spiral, gas-rich galaxies.The galaxies would have merged together a few billion years ago to shape
NGC 1316 as it appears today.
The
unprecedented sensitivity of the Hubble Advanced Camera for Surveys data
permitted the astronomers to detect faint globular clusters previously
impossible to reach. By counting the number of globular clusters detected as a
function of their brightness they could, for the first time, see evidence of
the gradual disruption of star clusters created during a past merger of
gas-rich galaxies. They found that the relative number of low-mass clusters is
significantly lower in the inner regions than in the outer regions, by an
amount consistent with theoretical predictions.
NGC
1316 is about 75 million light-years away on the outskirts of a nearby cluster
of galaxies in the southern constellation of Fornax. It is one of the brightest ellipticals
in the Fornax galaxy cluster and is also one of the
strongest and largest radio sources in the sky.
