NASA describes what they captured as a pair of eerie, staring eyes, surrounded by “streams” that are red like blood.
According to NASA, this chilling image was taken by the James Webb Space Telescope, developed by the agency and currently co-operated with the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).
The ghostly eyes seen from space are actually IC 2163 and NGC 2207, two galaxies that are actively forming stars.
The galaxies IC 2163 and NGC 2207 resemble glaring eyes from space – (Image: NASA/ESA/CSA).
Each year, these galaxies produce the equivalent mass of 20 of our Sun, while the Milky Way, which is aging and contains Earth, only produces about 2-3 times the mass of the Sun.
The eerie image captured by the telescope is due to their interaction with each other.
These galaxies first passed by each other millions of years ago and are continuing to do so once again.
The smaller spiral galaxy on the left, classified as IC 2163, is passing behind NGC 2207, the larger spiral galaxy on the right.
Every time they pass each other, the galaxies collide and are disturbed. This could lead to a complete merger in the future, starting from the “arms” of the spiral, followed by the bright core that is forming the eyes seen from space.
However, the merger phase we are observing is far from reaching that conclusion. The spiral structure of both galaxies is still clearly visible, indicating that they have not significantly affected each other yet.
In the near future, as gravitational forces pull them tighter together and interactions intensify, both galaxies will brighten significantly due to accelerated star formation.
Nevertheless, eventually, star formation will slow down as their reserves of gas and dust are depleted after the merger, and the scenery will become tranquil.
