An object 681 million light-years away might look like a mess, but there is a lot more going on.
In a new Hubble image, there is an object that is not one galaxy, but three, coming together in a massive merger that will one day end up as one huge galaxy.
Such objects can help us understand how our Universe will change over millions and billions of years, and how massive galaxies grow and evolve over millions and billions of years.
Given how much space there is out there, it seems like mergers should be rare, but they seem to be an important part of the evolution of the universe.
Multiple mergers have taken place in the 13.6 billion-year history of the Milky Way. Astronomers think that the universe is shaped by the interplay of the invisible Cosmic web and the forces of gravity.
IC 2431. Esa et al.
NASA, W. Keel, Dark Energy Survey, DOE, FNAL, DECam,CTIO, NOIRLab/NSF/AURA, SDSS are all credited.
Waves of star formation occur when dense clumps of material collapse under their own gravity to form baby stars because of the shock and compression of star-forming gas caused by these collisions.
A galaxy with star formation rates that are low is likely to see a flurry of activity during and after an interaction with another galaxy.
There are a number of triple mergers out there as well, but they are more commonly observed.
Depending on how complete the merger is, these are not always easy to spot.
At the later stages of a merger, the black holes at the center of each galaxy are drawn together and locked in a trinary circle. Sometimes one or more of the black holes can be obscured by dust.
Astronomers think that eventually, these black holes will combine, forming a giant black hole. The signals of one of these mergers have not been detected by our current detectors.
The more smash-ups we identify, the better we will be at understanding how they take place and how they roll out over millions of years.
You can download the image from the website.
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