[PHOTOS] Hubble Telescope Pictures Show Stunning View of “Grand Design” Galaxy, Surviving Star From Supernova

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has captured photographs showing a stunning view of a "Grand Design" Galaxy and another that shows a surviving star from a supernova, both of which could vastly increase experts' understanding of the universe.

The spiral galaxy, known as M99, fills the frame of the photo and shows the majestic cosmic region that is found roughly 42 light-years from Earth. It is found in the constellation Coma Berenices, and was given its name due to the well-defined, prominent spiral arms that are visible in the image.

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope

The telescope used its Wide Field Camera 3 to take the image on two separate occasions to help astronomers study two entirely different astronomical phenomena. The first set of observations seeks to explore a gap between two different varieties of cosmic explosions.

The second set of observations, on the other hand, was part of a large Hubble project that sought to chart the connections between young stars and the clouds of cold gas that they originated from. The Hubble Space Telescope inspected nearby galaxies to identify several clusters of hot, young stars, as per NASA.

In the first set, astronomers are trying to understand novae and supernovae, as the first is caused by interactions between white dwarfs and larger stars in binary systems and are far less bright compared to their larger counterpart. Supernovae, on the other hand, mark the catastrophically violent deaths of massive stars in the universe.

Current astronomical theories predict that certain sudden, specific events could occur that exudes brightness between those of novae and supernovae. While astronomers described the event as being extremely mysterious and controversial, one such event was observed in the M99 galaxy.

According to SciTechDaily, the galaxies that the Hubble Space Telescope inspected were galaxies that were also monitored by the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA). The latter is a colossal radio telescope that consists of 66 individual dishes found high in the Chilean Andes. That cooperation between the two telescopes will provide crucial insights into clouds of cold gas.

Mysterious Event

Hubble also discovered a fascinating event in the cosmos, which is when a star approaches the end of its life and runs out of fuel and resulting in a supernova. These events have so much destructive power that they can obliterate nearby stars and render planets like Earth uninhabitable if it was nearby.

But astronomers have recently been monitoring a tough star that has survived the process of its companion star going supernova. The data from the observation could help experts understand more about how stars evolve and die in the cosmos.

Researchers were looking for supernovae because of their desire to learn about the effects on a star's outermost layer, which is mainly composed of hydrogen when such an event occurs. But sometimes, after a supernova occurs, there is no trace left of hydrogen, which has become a mystery to experts.

To find the answer, NASA used Hubble to look for examples of these "stripped" supernovae and found what they were looking for in the 2013ge. This area used to be a binary system before one of the stars in the cosmic region went supernova and left a companion star behind following the explosion, SlashGear reported.

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Nasa, Hubble space telescope, Hubble, Supernova