3 Galaxy Clusters in Chaotic Merge; Massive Collision Captured in Striking Photo

Three galaxy clusters were caught in a chaotic knot, and the collision was captured in a magnificent image.

Three Galactic Clusters Are Merging

At least three galaxy clusters 780 million light-years from Earth are currently merging. The ongoing activity resulted in a massive concussion that was captured by a variety of telescopes.

The merging of the galactic clusters, each with hundreds or thousands of individual galaxies, formed an even larger galactic cluster called Abell 2256, Space.com reported.

Astronomers compiled data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and the European Space Agency's XMM-Newton, both of which are space telescopes, as well as Pan-STARRS at Haleakala Observatory in Hawaii; the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope in Pune, India; the Low Frequency Array in the Netherlands and neighboring European countries; and the Very Large Array near Sonoma, California, to determine what's happening inside this colliding galactic clusters.

X-rays are depicted in blue, radio waves in red, and optical and infrared light in yellow. The X-rays reveal clouds of heated gas, but the radio waves show jets of energy emanating from the black holes in the nuclei of galaxies across the cluster, as well as "relics" or filamentary structures displaying old shock waves from the catastrophic collision. The optical and infrared spots within Abell 2256 represent separate galaxies.

Using photos like this, Kamlesh Rajpurohit, an astronomer at the University of Bologna in Italy who leads a team studying Abell 2256, aims to uncover the origins of these huge galaxy clusters are among the largest formations in the universe. Galactic clusters are exciting to examine because they are the largest known particle accelerators in the universe and are hypothesized to be the source of enigmatic cosmic rays. With such a comprehensive photo, scientists can continue investigating the origin of these enigmatic energy bursts that travel close to the speed of light.

Rajpurohit and his colleagues have published two papers analyzing Abell 2256 - the first in The Astrophysical Journal in March 2022 and the second in Astronomy and Astrophysics in January 2023.

More About Galactic Cluster Abell 2256

Abell 2256 is a giant galaxy cluster that resembles a grainy, pixilated, sky blue cloud topped with licks of flaming red hair. The cloud is adorned with red shapes and streaks and set against a black background heavily dotted with colorful specks, according to Chandra X-Ray Observatory.

The center of the knot is the oval-shaped, sky-blue cloud pixelated with white dots. The blue cloud shows enormous reservoirs of superheated gas, with several million degrees Fahrenheit temperatures.

On the right side of the enormous cluster are various irregular shapes. One resembles a white bean with a red border. Another is a tangle of intersecting red shapes dangling from the cloud's base.

These filaments are the result of the interaction between jets and gas. Three other irregular red filaments are visible to the left of the huge cluster.

At the upper right edge of the enormous oval-shaped cluster are sweeping crimson sheets that resemble licks of red hair or smoldering flames. These remnants are the product of shockwaves, presumably caused by the collision of gas from various clusters.

Abell 2256 also comes with a radio halo, the enormous region of diffuse radio emission typically found at the centers of galaxy clusters. They have low surface brightness, making them hard to detect, but the brightness increases at lower frequencies, displaying the presence of the said regions, Phys.org reported.

The properties of Abell 2256's radio halo reportedly make it a peculiar object. Researchers said further studies might advance their knowledge about particle acceleration mechanisms on very large scales.

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