Sunday, September 15, 2024

Jellyfish Galaxies: NGC 3312 & NGC 3314

Jellyfish Galaxies: NGC 3312 & NGC 3314

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NGC 3312 (above center) and NGC 3314 (below center) are jellyfish galaxies in the Hydra Galaxy Cluster. Both galaxies have filamentary structures toward the lower right that resemble jellyfish’s tentacles. These structures were formed while the disk gas of the galaxies was stripped away by the intense gas pressure of the intergalactic gas as they moved. There may not be any other images like this, featuring two rare jellyfish galaxies in a single field of view.

NGC 3314 is a pair of galaxies (NGC 3314a and NGC 3314b) located at different distances. They overlap in the same line of sight from Earth and do not gravitationally interact. The foreground face-on galaxy (NGC 3314a) is the jellyfish galaxy, and the background inclined galaxy (NGC 3314b) does not have a tentacle-like structure.

Distance from Earth: About 194 million light-years (NGC 3312), 117 million light-years (NGC 3314a), 140 million light-years (NGC 3314b)
Instrument: Hyper Suprime-Cam (HSC)