A study of the pair of dwarf galaxies NGC 4532 and DDO 137 has revealed that they are connected by a giant bridge of hot gas. They also have something resembling a long tail. Both are the result of their interaction.
Dwarf galaxies
Researchers from the University of Western Australia at the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research have announced the discovery of a new “cosmic bridge” connecting two galaxies. This discovery can tell us a lot about how they interact.
We are talking about two dwarf systems, NGC 4532 and DDO 137, which are located 53 million light-years away from us in the direction of the Virgo cluster. The distance between them is 185,000 light years, and all this space is occupied by a strip of red-hot dust. In addition, the systems have a tail 1.6 million light-years long.
The observations were part of ASKAP’s wide-field survey of the entire sky in the L-band, known as the Legacy All-sky Survey (WALLABY). This large-scale project maps the sky and studies the distribution of gaseous hydrogen in galaxies using the ASKAP radio telescope, owned and operated by CSIRO, Australia’s national science agency.
What did the studies show?
Thanks to research into neutral hydrogen radiation, scientists have learned what is happening there. The galaxies NGC 4532 and DDO 137 are preparing to merge, but until that moment happens, they are orbiting each other at high speed.
It should be noted that the vicinity of the Virgo cluster is a fairly dense region. Therefore, it is not surprising that the two systems flew into a cloud of hydrogen drifting in intergalactic space. Their movement pulled it out in the form of a long tail and heated the gas, which began to actively emit radiation.
Apparently, this is something that happens quite often when galaxies collide. Something similar can be expected in 2-3 billion years, when the Milky Way and Andromeda begin to merge.
According to phys.org
