Super Spiral Galaxies Amaze Astronomers

Scientific American ^ | 8 Dec, 2015 | KEN CROSWELL

[MtnClimber]

They're big, they're bright, they're beautiful—and they shouldn't even exist, at least to our current astronomical knowledge: gargantuan spiral galaxies that make our giant Milky Way seem downright modest. Spirals are supposed to be small fry compared to the greatest giant ellipticals, which are football-shaped swarms of stars thought to be the universe’s biggest and brightest galaxies. But now a search across billions of light-years has snared a rare breed of "super spiral" galaxies that rival their giant elliptical peers in size and luminosity, raising questions over how such behemoths are born. "I was really surprised," says Patrick Ogle, an astronomer at the California Institute of Technology who discovered the super spirals earlier this year. Ogle looked for them by analyzing the NASA Extragalactic Database, an online compendium of galaxy information. He examined nearly 800,000 galaxies within 3.5 billion light-years of Earth, ranking them by luminosity—in particular, by how much visible light they radiate.

[allendale]

Interesting as is most theoretical physics when considered by laymen. However theoretical physicists are not much different than philosophers. The question is are these theories proven by reproducible definitive experimentation. Not saying the “big bang “ theory is wrong but how would you prove it and how do you explain all the matter of the universe originating from such a small theoretical volume? Or please explain how 0x0= anything other than 0.

[Red Badger]

Sporting a double nucleus, the super spiral galaxy CGCG 122-067 in the constellation Leo emits roughly eight times as much visible light as the Milky Way. Credit: Sloan Digital Sky Survey