Amazing Galaxies: Capable of telling the story of cosmic evolution

Science: Using the Very Large Telescope (VLT), located in the Atacama Desert region of northern Chile, astronomers have revealed five stunning images of galaxies in the local universe. The images of these galaxies show their shapes, structures and distribution of stars in stunning and colorful detail. Some of the galaxies lie at the edge of the so-called “Local Group,” a galaxy collection that includes our home, the Milky Way, while others are more distant.

The observations can help astronomers better understand cosmic evolution and how galaxies form stars as well as snatch other stellar bodies, gas and dust from neighboring galaxies through gravitational interactions. The images were collected as part of the VST Survey of Mass Assembly and Structural Hierarchy (VST-SMASH). The five galaxies included in the observations, released Friday (Nov. 15), are just a small part of the total 27 galaxies that astronomers are investigating during the VST-SMASH project.

One of the most distant galaxies in the newly released collection is the spiral galaxy IC 5332, which can be seen below. It is located about 30 million light-years away in the constellation of the Sculptor. The galaxies were selected because they lie in the same part of the sky being investigated by the Euclid space telescope, which will provide blue-wavelength images of the same galaxies observed in red wavelengths by the VLT’s Visible Instrument (VIS) and in the near-infrared by the latter’s Near-Infrared Spectrometer and Photometer (NISP) instrument. One of the most famous galaxies in the collection is the so-called “Southern Pinwheel” galaxy, also known as NGC 5236 or M83. It is located about 15 million light-years away.