The James Webb Space Telescope was able to capture the spiral galaxy NGC 3256, located about 120 million light-years from Earth in the constellation of Parus. Portal reports News Bytes.
The galaxy belongs to the Hydra-Centaurus Supercluster (the Laniakea supercluster is the closest supercluster to the Virgo Supercluster) and is the result of a collision between an equal-mass double spiral galaxy estimated to have occurred around 500 million years. before. According to scientists from NASA, this galaxy was formed as a result of the direct collision of two other spiral galaxies that occurred about 500 million years ago.
Although this galaxy has been photographed previously by the Hubble telescope, the observatory studies space in the infrared range of light and has more opportunities to see the most detailed features of such distant objects, as its instruments are more sensitive than other telescopes. Thanks to this, scientists got much more data about the galaxy NGC 3256.
At the center of the galaxy are areas of orange color, where young stars are emerging as galaxies collide. In this case, most of the new stars are located in the spiral arms of the galaxy emanating from the center.
Formerly “James Webb” discovered the first strands of the cosmic web.
Source: Gazeta
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