Stephan's Quintet, composite image 照片檔

Composite image of Stephan's Quintet. This is a grouping of five galaxies located in the constellation Pegasus. Although called a 'quintet' only four of the galaxies are truly close together, NGC 7320 (upper left) is located about 40 million light years away and is not an actual member of the galaxy group. The others are located 290 million light years away and are NGC 7319 (top), NGC 7317 (bottom) and two interacting galaxies (centre) NGC 7318A (lower) and NGC 7318B (upper). Gravitational interactions are causing trails of gas, dust and stars between the galaxies. Studying nearby galaxies like these helps to understand how interacting galaxies trigger star formation in each other. This image is a composite of data from the Hubble Space Telescope, the James Webb Space Telescope and the Subaru Telescope at the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ) in Hawaii, USA