APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

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APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

Post by APOD Robot » Fri Dec 02, 2022 5:06 am

Image Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096

Explanation: Bright at infrared wavelengths, this merging galaxy pair is some 500 million light-years away toward the constellation Delphinus. The cosmic mashup is seen against a background of even more distant galaxies, and occasional spiky foreground stars. But the galaxy merger itself spans about 100,000 light-years in this deep James Webb Space Telescope image. The image data is from Webb's Near-InfraRed Camera (NIRCam) and Mid-InfraRed Instrument (MIRI). Their combined, sharp infrared view follows galactic scale restructuring in the dusty merger's wild jumble of intense star forming regions and distorted spiral arms

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Re: APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

Post by AVAO » Fri Dec 02, 2022 6:31 am

.
I like Zw II 96 - especially the white beauty and her black prince :wink:

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https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/523 ... af27_o.jpg
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Re: APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

Post by orin stepanek » Fri Dec 02, 2022 1:22 pm

potm2211a_1024.jpg
I counted 30 + galaxtes! :shock:
AntennaeGpotw1345a_1024.jpg
Awesome; just beautiful! MW & Andromeda someday; maybe! :roll:
OIP.jpg
OIP.jpg (4.24 KiB) Viewed 2876 times
Reminds me of an Embryo! Sort of!
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Re: APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

Post by johnnydeep » Fri Dec 02, 2022 5:14 pm

Is the blue cloud with a denser blue middle in the top half of the image another galaxy remnant or debris from the merger of the two more distinct galaxies?
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Re: APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

Post by Ann » Fri Dec 02, 2022 5:59 pm


I feel more confused by the JWST image than by the Hubble one. The Hubble image underscores the starburst nature of this merging pair of galaxies. I took most of the caption of the Hubble image from Wikipedia, which wrote:
Powerful young starburst regions hang as long threadlike structures between the main galaxy cores.
Indeed. But these long threadlike structures of hot blue stars are not very striking in the JWST image at all. The "in-your-face" feature of the JWST image is all the red stuff, the dust.

(But okay, there is a "clump" of blue-white cores surrounded by orange-colored jets and arcs in the JWST image that is quite striking.)
Johnnydeep wrote:
Is the blue cloud with a denser blue middle in the top half of the image another galaxy remnant or debris from the merger of the two more distinct galaxies?
My guess is that it is a galaxy remnant.

What the JWST image tells us is that this "blue cloud" at top in the JWST image is dust-free. That's why there is no red stuff there in the JWST image. The blue color means that JWST has detected light from cool red and yellow stars. The HST image does indeed tell us that this feature (seen at bottom in the HST image) appears to be made up of old stars only. Bright threads of hot blue stars that are seen superimposed on the cloud-like collection of yellow stars are foreground features.

The somewhat bright more or less horizontal feature in the blue (JWST) or yellow (Hubble) cloud of stars is most likely a bar. That strongly suggests, at least to me, that this feature was originally a galaxy of its own.

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Re: APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

Post by bystander » Fri Dec 02, 2022 6:21 pm

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Re: APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

Post by Avalon » Fri Dec 02, 2022 11:26 pm

Are the red diagonal lines going from 10 o'clock to 4 o'clock in the top distorted galaxy artifacts or jets or a gigantic accretion disc of some sort or...?

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Re: APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

Post by Chris Peterson » Sat Dec 03, 2022 2:10 am

Avalon wrote: Fri Dec 02, 2022 11:26 pm Are the red diagonal lines going from 10 o'clock to 4 o'clock in the top distorted galaxy artifacts or jets or a gigantic accretion disc of some sort or...?
They are the standard JWST diffraction spikes. Notice how they are parallel to the spikes seen around the bright star below as well as around some of the other bright objects.
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Re: APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

Post by johnnydeep » Sat Dec 03, 2022 4:11 pm

Chris Peterson wrote: Sat Dec 03, 2022 2:10 am
Avalon wrote: Fri Dec 02, 2022 11:26 pm Are the red diagonal lines going from 10 o'clock to 4 o'clock in the top distorted galaxy artifacts or jets or a gigantic accretion disc of some sort or...?
They are the standard JWST diffraction spikes. Notice how they are parallel to the spikes seen around the bright star below as well as around some of the other bright objects.
Ok, I'll ask: why don't some similarly bright things, like, for instance, the cores of the two colliding galaxies, show similar diffraction spikes? Is it just that the spikes are being washed out by the cores' bright surroundings?
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Re: APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

Post by VictorBorun » Sat Dec 03, 2022 6:03 pm

johnnydeep wrote: Sat Dec 03, 2022 4:11 pm
Chris Peterson wrote: Sat Dec 03, 2022 2:10 am
Avalon wrote: Fri Dec 02, 2022 11:26 pm Are the red diagonal lines going from 10 o'clock to 4 o'clock in the top distorted galaxy artifacts or jets or a gigantic accretion disc of some sort or...?
They are the standard JWST diffraction spikes. Notice how they are parallel to the spikes seen around the bright star below as well as around some of the other bright objects.
Ok, I'll ask: why don't some similarly bright things, like, for instance, the cores of the two colliding galaxies, show similar diffraction spikes? Is it just that the spikes are being washed out by the cores' bright surroundings?
Last JWST's time it was a central black hole.
I wonder if the disk galaxy at the bottom has just sawn another galaxy in two thinner discs with half-cores?
The sawyer galaxy sent one thinner disk 1 o'clock from the victim's central BH and another 7 o'clock, and shifted the BH (with no galactic core left to cover it) 6 o'clock a little, and left a trail all the way from its core to the victim's central BH?
IIZw096 +arrows-.jpg
Let me hang HST's image of 2008 over this APOD
Click to view full size image 1 or image 2
IIZw096 +HST.jpg
...

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Re: APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

Post by VictorBorun » Sat Dec 03, 2022 6:55 pm

I tried to think of a way to send stellar population of a disk galaxy flying in two opposite direction…
And failed.
The gas of a disk galaxy is viscous.
The dust may be dragged by the gas flow and by radiation.
An active BH might blew them both away.
But not the stellar population and, for that matter, the dark matter halo of that disk galaxy

Must be a rogue AGN.
This NIR-bright (JWST-spiky) object seem to have two pairs of jets and a curved dusty trail from the disk galaxy at the bottom.
A rogue AGN might belong to the dwarf galaxy at the left, seeing it's curved stellar trail is almost parallel.
A dwarf galaxy can loose its central black hole when piercing a disk galaxy if both central BHs get really close for a moment, can it not?
The dwarf and the rogue AGN's trails we currently see are missing the core of the disk galaxy, so this is not their first orbit after the separation.
Click to view full size image 1 or image 2
IIZw096 +arrows-3.jpg
IIZw096 +arrows-3+HST.jpg
...
Last edited by VictorBorun on Sat Dec 03, 2022 11:29 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

Post by Chris Peterson » Sat Dec 03, 2022 11:23 pm

johnnydeep wrote: Sat Dec 03, 2022 4:11 pm
Chris Peterson wrote: Sat Dec 03, 2022 2:10 am
Avalon wrote: Fri Dec 02, 2022 11:26 pm Are the red diagonal lines going from 10 o'clock to 4 o'clock in the top distorted galaxy artifacts or jets or a gigantic accretion disc of some sort or...?
They are the standard JWST diffraction spikes. Notice how they are parallel to the spikes seen around the bright star below as well as around some of the other bright objects.
Ok, I'll ask: why don't some similarly bright things, like, for instance, the cores of the two colliding galaxies, show similar diffraction spikes? Is it just that the spikes are being washed out by the cores' bright surroundings?
The more extended the source, the less obvious the diffraction spikes. Also, keep in mind that images like this have their brightness curves stretched non-linearly. Just because something looks as bright as something else doesn't mean that both are actually equally bright.
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Re: APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

Post by johnnydeep » Sat Dec 03, 2022 11:58 pm

Chris Peterson wrote: Sat Dec 03, 2022 11:23 pm
johnnydeep wrote: Sat Dec 03, 2022 4:11 pm
Chris Peterson wrote: Sat Dec 03, 2022 2:10 am

They are the standard JWST diffraction spikes. Notice how they are parallel to the spikes seen around the bright star below as well as around some of the other bright objects.
Ok, I'll ask: why don't some similarly bright things, like, for instance, the cores of the two colliding galaxies, show similar diffraction spikes? Is it just that the spikes are being washed out by the cores' bright surroundings?
The more extended the source, the less obvious the diffraction spikes. Also, keep in mind that images like this have their brightness curves stretched non-linearly. Just because something looks as bright as something else doesn't mean that both are actually equally bright.
Hmm, ok.
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Re: APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

Post by VictorBorun » Sun Dec 04, 2022 12:24 am

Chris Peterson wrote: Sat Dec 03, 2022 11:23 pm
johnnydeep wrote: Sat Dec 03, 2022 4:11 pm
Chris Peterson wrote: Sat Dec 03, 2022 2:10 am

They are the standard JWST diffraction spikes. Notice how they are parallel to the spikes seen around the bright star below as well as around some of the other bright objects.
Ok, I'll ask: why don't some similarly bright things, like, for instance, the cores of the two colliding galaxies, show similar diffraction spikes? Is it just that the spikes are being washed out by the cores' bright surroundings?
The more extended the source, the less obvious the diffraction spikes. Also, keep in mind that images like this have their brightness curves stretched non-linearly. Just because something looks as bright as something else doesn't mean that both are actually equally bright.
In this APOD an isolated point source of light in the centre has spikes of ruby red; the point looks saturated white, trivially.
In the core of the dwarf galaxy there is a white point or two; no spikes.
They both look saturated white dots too but they are really 100 or 1000 times dimmer, judging by the absence of any spikes.

Central black holes are active and bright in some galaxies' nuclei but quiet or absent in others
Last edited by VictorBorun on Sun Dec 04, 2022 4:48 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: APOD: Merging Galaxy Pair IIZw096 (2022 Dec 02)

Post by VictorBorun » Sun Dec 04, 2022 12:25 am

VictorBorun wrote: Sun Dec 04, 2022 12:24 am
Chris Peterson wrote: Sat Dec 03, 2022 11:23 pm
johnnydeep wrote: Sat Dec 03, 2022 4:11 pm

Ok, I'll ask: why don't some similarly bright things, like, for instance, the cores of the two colliding galaxies, show similar diffraction spikes? Is it just that the spikes are being washed out by the cores' bright surroundings?
The more extended the source, the less obvious the diffraction spikes. Also, keep in mind that images like this have their brightness curves stretched non-linearly. Just because something looks as bright as something else doesn't mean that both are actually equally bright.
In this APOD an isolated point source of light in the centre has spikes of ruby red; the point looks saturated white, trivially.
In the core of the dwarf galaxy there is a white point or two; no spikes.
They both look saturated white dots too but they are really 100 or 1000 times dimmer, judging by the absence of any spikes.

Central black holes are active and bright in some galaxies' nuclei but quiet or absent in others

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