![]() ![]() SPRI was able to secure the collection within a tight purchasing deadline thanks to changes to HLF’s urgent acquisitions criteria. The Institute is, in a very real way, a long-term legacy of the endeavours of Scott and his companions and a fitting home for his photographs.” “Research is one side of SPRI, the other, our polar library, archive and museum, are a very important part of our activities. There are a number of beautifully composed images of the expedition’s camps on the ice and the tranquility of a calm Antarctic evening. The photographs themselves were printed in the Antarctic by members of Scott's team as they waited for his return from the Pole, and for most of the past 70 years were considered lost.Ĭaptain Scott was taught photography by the official expedition photographer, Herbert Ponting, and the collection charts his first attempts through to the remarkable images he captured on the first part of the Polar journey to the head of the Beardmore Glacier.ĭirector of SPRI, Dr Julian Dowdeswell, said: “The hundred or so photographs taken by Scott provide a hitherto unseen view into a number of facets of the expedition’s progress towards the Pole. Subjects include his companions, the ponies and sledges, the scientific work they were undertaking and the breathtaking Antarctic landscape. Matching funds also came from the UK Antarctic Heritage Trust, the Staples Trust and other private donors.Ī remarkable collection, the photographs give a view of the Antarctic as seen through Captain Scott's eyes as he documented the first part of his epic journey to the South Pole. With its dearth of star-forming gas, Messier 89 now exhibits minimal star formation and is made up primarily of older, low-mass stars and ancient globular clusters.Dozens of MPs and Peers were given rare, personal access to the photos after they were saved for the nation through the efforts of SPRI, with a major grant from HLF, who hosted yesterday’s reception. It is likely that NGC 4568 and NGC 4567 will eventually resemble their more-mature neighbor Messier 89, an elliptical galaxy that also resides in the Virgo Cluster. The new Gemini image was produced from data taken in 2020.īy combining decades of observations and computer modeling, astronomers now have compelling evidence that merging spiral galaxies like these go on to become elliptical galaxies. This merger is also a preview of what will happen when the Milky Way and its closest large galactic neighbor the Andromeda Galaxy collide in about 5 billion years.Ī bright region in the center of one of NGC 4568's sweeping spiral arms is the fading afterglow of a supernova-known as SN 2020fqv-that was detected in 2020. Zamani (NSF's NOIRLab)Music: Stellardrone - A Moment of Stillness ![]() Miller (Gemini Observatory/NSF's NOIRLab), M. Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage/NSF's NOIRLab), J. van der Marel (STScI)Image Processing: T.A. Credit: Images and Videos: International Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/F. Also visible in the image is the glowing remains of a supernova that was detected in 2020. These galaxies are entangled by their mutual gravitational field and will eventually combine to form a single elliptical galaxy in around 500 million years. By that point, much of the gas and dust (the fuel for star formation) in this system will have been used up or blown away.Ī new image captured by the Gemini North telescope in Hawai'i reveals a pair of interacting spiral galaxies - NGC 4568 and NGC 4567 - as they begin to clash and merge. Over millions of years, the galaxies will repeatedly swing past each other in ever-tightening loops, drawing out long streamers of stars and gas until their individual structures are so thoroughly mixed that a single, essentially spherical, galaxy emerges from the chaos. Those placid conditions, however, will change.Īs NGC 4568 and NGC 4567 draw together and coalesce, their dueling gravitational forces will trigger bursts of intense stellar formation and wildly distort their once-majestic structures. At present, the centers of these galaxies are still 20,000 light-years apart (about the distance from Earth to the center of the Milky Way) and each galaxy still retains its original, pinwheel shape. The two stately spiral galaxies, NGC 4568 (bottom) and NGC 4567 (top), are poised to undergo one of the most spectacular events in the universe, a galactic merger. Gemini North, one of the twin telescopes of the International Gemini Observatory, operated by NSF's NOIRLab, has observed the initial stages of a cosmic collision approximately 60 million light-years away in the direction of the constellation Virgo. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |