UGC 10214 ('The Tadpole') (IMAGE)

Rochester Institute of Technology

UGC 10214 ('The Tadpole')

Caption

An optical image of the "Tadpole" galaxy, an interacting galaxy, taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. Material stripped from the galaxy during its collision with a smaller galaxy (seen in the upper left corner of the larger interaction partner) forms a long tidal tail. Young blue stars, star clusters and tidal dwarf galaxies are born in these tidal debris. These objects move in a common direction within a plane defined by the orientation and motion of their tidal tail. A similar galaxy interaction might have occurred in the Local Group in the past, which could explain the distribution of dwarf galaxies in co-rotating planes.

Credit

NASA, Holland Ford (JHU), the ACS Science Team and ESA

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