NGC 1512, 1510

NGC 1512,1510  Galaxies come in a range of shapes and sizes, and astronomers use this fact to classify them based on their appearance. NGC 1512 is a barred spiral galaxy approximately 38 million light years away from Earth^[2] in the constellation Horologium which is greek for a pendulum clock. The galaxy displays a double ring structure, with a small inner ring around the galactic nucleus and an extended inner disc with at least 200 clusters with recent star formation activity. NGC 1512 extends  beyond the outer ring — displaying malformed, tendril-like spiral arms.  The tiny NGC 1510 to the lower left, on the other hand, is a dwarf galaxy. Despite their very different sizes, each galaxy affects the other through gravity, causing slow changes in their appearances. These huge arms are thought to be warped by strong gravitational interactions with NGC 1510 and the accretion of material from it. The bar in NGC 1512 acts as a cosmic funnel, channeling the raw materials required for star formation from the outer ring into the heart of the galaxy. This pipeline of gas and dust in NGC 1512 fuels intense star birth in the bright, blue, shimmering inner disk known as a circumnuclear starburst ring, which spans 2,400 light-years. Both the bar and the starburst ring are thought to be at least in part the result of the interaction between the two galaxies — a merger that has been going on for 400 million years. This ring is dotted with dozens of HII regions, where large swathes of hydrogen gas are subject to intense radiation from nearby, newly formed stars. This radiation causes the gas to glow and creates the bright knots of light seen throughout the ring.The image was done by Michael Adler using data from Rio Hurtado Chile using a 24″ CDK24 telescope. The considerable details in the inner galaxy was brought out using BlurX, and Topaz DeNoise was used to reduce the noise in the outer galaxy.