Out of a vast galactic menagerie of space images, a pair of celestial “angel wings” was discovered by researchers—the stunning spectacle, composed of trails of stars and dust, formed as a result of two galaxies colliding.
The picture, taken by NASA/ESA’s Hubble Space Telescope, shows a nearly symmetrical object in the VV689 system, in the constellation Leo, which is actually the product of two distinct galaxies in the process of merging.
Although stars in galaxies are typically too far apart to collide with other stars in such encounters, the gravitational interaction between these two objects is enough to cause deformations, throwing stars into different orbits. This yielded the almost symmetrical trails of stars and dust and gave rise to the object’s nickname: the Angel Wing.
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