NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has found a galaxy spiraling 150 million light-years away from our Milky Way in the Aries constellation.
Despite its calm and peaceful appearance, the NGC 976 has played host to one of the most violent astronomical phenomena known – a supernova explosion, reports NASA.
These cataclysmically violent events take place at the end of the lives of massive stars and can outshine entire galaxies for a short period.
While supernovae mark the deaths of massive stars, they are also responsible for the creation of heavy elements that are incorporated into later generations of stars and planets.
“This image – which was created using data from Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 – comes from a large collection of Hubble observations of nearby galaxies which host supernovae as well as a pulsating class of stars known as Cepheid variables,” read the NASA report about the discovery of this galaxy.
Both Cepheids and supernovae are used to measure astronomical distances, and galaxies containing both objects provide useful natural laboratories where the two methods can be calibrated against one another.
Also read: NASA: Citizen scientists spot Jupiter-like planet. Here’s all we know
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