Hubble Sights Galaxy in Transition

This NASA Hubble Space Telescope image reveals an enigmatic galaxy with a bright center and a face that hints at spiral structure, yet it holds no obvious spiral arms. Reddish-brown clumps and filaments of dust partially obscure the galaxy’s full face, while red, blue, and orange light from distant galaxies shines through its diffuse outer regions and dots the inky-black background.

NGC 1266 is a lenticular galaxy located some 100 million light-years away in the constellation Eridanus (the Celestial River). Astronomers classify lenticulars as transitional galaxies that represent an evolutionary bridge between spirals and ellipticals. Lenticulars are “lens-shaped” and have a bright central bulge and flattened disk like spirals, but they have no spiral arms and little to no star formation like ellipticals.

Read more about NGC 1266, its interesting features, and why astronomers study galaxies like it.

Image credit: NASA, ESA, K. Alatalo (STScI); Image Processing: G. Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America)