7 Weirdest Galaxies In The Universe

Our Universe is a
wonderful place and it’s packed with billions upon billions of
galaxies, most of which we haven’t even seen yet. But even from the
relatively small amount of galaxies we managed to observe there are
some really bizarre ones. Just to think that out there in the
vastness of space there are galaxies shaped like jelly fish and the
ones that are simply devouring all other galaxies around them. Not to
mention the ones those are looking like a huge eye peering right into
space! Well, Universe is awesome like that and here are 7 weirdest
galaxies you’ve ever seen.

Smiley galaxy

Galaxy SDSS
J1038+4849, also known as the Smiley galaxy, looks exactly like that
– a cheerful smiling face! The eyes and nose of the smiley are
uniquely positioned galaxies, while the curves are created due to
gravitational lensing. The light simply distorts around this cluster
due to its high density, turning into these liquid-looking curves.

The Cannibal

Galaxies
obviously get bored hanging out in space all alone – that’s when
they start interacting with other ones, usually smaller defenceless
galaxies that up for devouring. Well, it appears our very own Milky
Way will collide with Andromeda Galaxy in some 4.5 billion years.
It’s hard to tell which galaxy will prevail, but humanity probably
won’t be around to see it as our own Sun will get too hot by that
time.

Milky Way, the
thief

Our good old
Milky Way is also a weirdo! Our home galaxy has been snatching
neighbouring galaxies, making them part of its own orbit since the
beginning of times. There are at least 6 galaxies that we know of
that used to orbit Large Magellanic Cloud, a galaxy located about
163,000 light years from us. Now they’re all part of Milky Way!

The grand
collision

What happens when
four galaxies collide? An abstract, yet beautiful mix of dark matter,
gas, and galaxies stretched for over 13 million light years. This
galaxy is called MACS J0717 and It’s a truly fascinating sight
indeed!

Two dark
hearts

A galaxy with two
hearts is about as rare as a human with two hearts! Well, maybe not
that rare, but it’s definitely not something astronomers see every
day. NGC 7674 has not one, but two dark holes at its heart. This
probably happened as a result of two galaxies colliding into one

The Mother of
Supernovas

Messier 83, also
known as simply M83, is bizarre in a couple of ways. It has a
weird-looking double nucleus, but that’s nor the weirdest part. M83
is a supersight for supernovas. These beautiful star explosions are
actually rare to observe. Yet astronomers have seen six supernovas in
the galaxy and detected remnants of 300 more!

Galaxies on a Date

One might think that these two are just another case of galaxies colliding into each other as it often happens in the Universe, but not this time. We can say that galaxies NGC3314a & NGC3314b are simply meeting each other in space on a kind of a date, but still they are separated by millions of light years. We get this amazing view only because they overlap from our vintage point here, on Earth!