The Hubble Space Telescope has revealed an image of the spiral galaxy UGC 5460, which is located 60 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Ursa Major.
This was reported by the European Space Agency.
The new image combines four different wavelengths of light, revealing a central band of stars, winding spiral arms, and bright blue star clusters. Also visible in the upper left corner of the image is a much closer object—a star that lives just 577 light-years from Earth in its own galaxy.
ESA / Hubble / NASA
Two supernovae, SN 2011ht and SN 2015as, recently erupted in the galaxy UGC 5460. It was because of them that Hubble focused its gaze on this galaxy.
SN 2015as became a supernova after a core collapse—a catastrophic explosion that occurs when the core of a star much more massive than the Sun runs out of fuel and collapses under its own gravity. Hubbleʼs observations of SN 2015as will help researchers understand what happens when the expanding shock wave of a supernova collides with the gas surrounding the exploded star.
SN 2011ht could have been a true supernova, a star that exploded due to the collapse of its core. But it could also have been a so-called pseudo-supernova, a rare type of star — a bright blue variable.
Bright blue variables are very rare stars that experience powerful explosions. They can be so powerful that they look like a real supernova explosion.
The Hubble Space Telescope will study the explosions of SN 2011ht to see if a star remains. If it still exists, it would mean that SN 2011ht was a bright blue variable star, not a true supernova.
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