How does a galaxy die? Either the stars burn out and the galaxy fades into oblivion, or the stupendous gravitational forces inside and outside the galaxy slowly rips it apart. This is what is about (well, in a billion years or so) to happen to NGC 1427A. According to HubbleSite, this irregular galaxy is under the gravitational grasp of a large gang of galaxies, called the Fornax cluster. Our poor galaxy is plunging headlong into this cluster at 600 kilometers per second.
NGC 1427A (Courtesy: HubbleSite)
NGC 1427A (Courtesy: HubbleSite)
Death Of A Galaxy
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12 Comments:
How can we establish the begining
and the end of somebody's existence, just using our limited Human senses?
But Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies will collide in 3 billion years, so perhaps not!
But of course, it is *not* an individual who deciphers all the nature's wonders. It is a collective effort, spanning centuries, that has brought us to this day. So, even though a single human is mortal, humanity need not be!
'n about the instrument,I've to say,there are 3 kinds of stars,first one star which is roundin' in its orbit alone,second two stars which are roundin' in one orbit cuz of their gravity that effects the other,'n third many stars that are livin' around each other due to their gravity.The second form called eclipse stars I think,if I translate it correctly.I worked on them,I assembled two lamps as two stars first,which were circlin',then a photocell recieved their light with a plane which passes their core,so at one time you can 2 seprate stars 'n the other time,maybe the bigger or maybe the smaller is infront of the other,so you see 1 star,cuz they cover each other,at this time the light recieved by the photocell changes,then a circuit changed the analog signals to digital ones(A to D),then with the aid of parallel port of the pc the digital signals entered the pc,after all a program which I had written it with C++ draw the curve of changin' lights of those stars,then I could analyze the curve 'n gain information.I did it for real stars too but cuz lack of support 'n instruments 'n some other problems I left it.But I have new ideas in my mind,no time,the most reason for me that I cann proceed them.The project above win the first prize in Iran 'n the president gave me a price.I hope someday I can go on with my new thoughts...by the way,excuse me for my poor English.
To do it with actual stars, you would need a sufficient;y high resolution, though. Also, you have to make corrections for atmospheric interference/absorptions. It would be interesting to see if a home-grown project could do that :-).
But even a partial result from such a difficult experimental setup would be a great achievement.
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