The Hubble Space Telescope from NASA and ESA have made many amazing discoveries over the years. Since it was released into the Earth's orbit in 1990, it has sent back some of the best photos of the universe outside the world. Though it is not the first of its kind, it is the largest and most versatile. Recently, the Hubble Space Telescope provided new images of a rare galaxy.
NASA describes the galaxy as looking like a flat pancake. However, because it is tilted at one end, it somehow resembles a skyrocket as well. What makes it even more stunning is its tail of blazing stars. The dwarf galaxy is called Kiso 5639 or LEDA 36252.
Most images of galaxies illustrate a more circular shape, as compared to the one of Kiso 5639. Debra Elmegreen, lead researcher of Vassar College, explains that all galaxies, including the Milky Way, grow from accreting gas from surrounding neighborhoods. It is because of th
is that all galaxies, at one point or another, resemble LEDA 36252.
Elmegreed used Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3 to capture the detailed image of the galaxy. Scientists will use different filters to study the same. The use of different filters will reveal information by dissecting its light and its component colors.
According to Nature World News, a dwarf or tadpole galaxy is the rarest form of galaxy in the local universe. In fact, astronomers believe that in a sample as large as 10,000 galaxies, only around 20 of those will be of the tadpole variety.
The rarity of a dwarf galaxy is what makes the image of LEDA 36252 amazing as well. Very little is known about galaxies like this, because there are not that many to study.
Because it is so rare, astronomers greatly consider tadpole galaxies as fossils from the early Universe. They are supposed to be best for cosmic studies, particularly the growth of cosmic gas, the formation of global star clusters and any starburst activity.
