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Saturday, March 24, 2012

Weird Rectangular Galaxy Found!

Like they said, "They found 3000 galaxies in a telescope picture the size of 1/16th by 1/16th."
We serve an Awesome Creator God Almighty!
  Psalm 19:1-2, "The heavens declare the glory of God,
and the skies announce what his hands have made.
  Day after day they tell the story;
night after night they tell it again."

From National Geographic:
A rectangular galaxy.


Rachel Kaufman
Published March 20, 2012
Not only are there diamonds in the sky, some of them are emerald-cut sparklers, according to astronomers who've found an unusual rectangular galaxy.
The cosmic oddball, dubbed LEDA 074886, is a dwarf galaxy 70 million light-years away in the constellation Eridanus, the River.
Most galaxies exist in one of three forms: a disk with spiral arms (such as our Milky Way), a football-shaped ellipsoid, or an irregular, lumpy blob.
But LEDA 074886 is a remarkably symmetrical rectangle, akin to an emerald-cut gem.
Astronomer Alister Graham, an associate professor at Swinburne University of Technology in Australia, was among the first to spot the weird galaxy in an image taken for an unrelated project with the Subaru Telescope in Hawaii.
When Graham first saw the boxy shape, "I thought it was a mistake," he said. "And then I couldn't stop smiling."
The emerald-cut dwarf was spotted along the edge of a much more massive elliptical galaxy known as NGC 1407.
The smaller, faint galaxy has 50 times fewer stars than the Milky Way, which helps explain why the odd object went undetected for so long.
Graham and colleagues think the galaxy is actually shaped like a short cylinder—"like a case of CDs"—that we happen to see from the side.

God's best 2 U,       Joy J

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