Abell 370- A huge cluster of galaxies

Recently, the Hubble Space Telescope of NASA has shared the image of a huge cluster of galaxies.

About Abell 370

• It is a huge cluster of galaxies which is located approximately 4 billion light-years away from the Earth.
• The galaxy is located in the Cetus constellation.
• The core of the galaxy is made up of several hundred galaxies.
• The galaxy has been named after the George Abell, who had catalogued the cluster.
• This galaxy comprises of several arcs of light. The largest galaxy is the 30 inched in length.

Cluster of Galaxies

It is a structure comprising of hundreds to thousands of galaxies. These galaxies are sticked together by the gravity. These galaxies usually have masses ranging from 1014–1015 solar masses. The most prominent feature of the clusters is its intracluster medium (ICM). The ICM comprises of the heated gas in between the galaxies. ICM has the temperature between 2–15 keV which depends on the total mass of the cluster.

Cetus Constellation

It is a Constellation (an area on the celestial sphere). It has been named after a sea monster in Greek mythology which was called as the Cetus. It lies in that region of the sky which are comprising of other water-related constellations like Aquarius, Pisces and Eridanus.

Hubble Space Telescope

This space telescope by NASA was launched into low Earth orbit in the year 1990. The telescope is still in operation. This telescope is one of the largest and most versatile telescopes. This telescope is well known for the vital research tool. It has been named after the astronomer Edwin Hubble. The telescope was developed by the United State Space Agency NASA and the European Space Agency. It orbits outside the distortion of Earth’s atmosphere and captures the extremely high-resolution images with substantially lower background light.